German state faces legal action for increasing arms supplies to Israel

Last week, lawyers representing German citizens, whose family members have been killed in Israel’s ongoing military assault on Gaza, filed a criminal complaint against the country’s senior politicians for 'aiding and abetting war crimes and genocide'.

In the lawsuit, German politicians, including Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, are held responsible for the “war crimes” and “genocide” in Gaza because of Berlin’s increasing role in supplying weapons to Israel in recent months, says Nadija Samour, one of the lawyers in the case.

"We filed a criminal complaint against the Federal Security Council, which is responsible for licensing arms exports and have been doing so, increasingly, tenfold since October 7. They're doing this in support of Israel and we think this is aiding and abetting genocide."

More than 30,000 Palestinians, many of them women and children, have been killed in the indiscriminate Israeli bombings.

Entire neighbourhoods and towns in Gaza have been reduced to rubble. Hundreds of thousands of desperate people have been forced to abandon their homes and take shelter in a narrow strip in Rafah.

The UN and other relief agencies are warning that a famine is looming as Israel is blocking delivery of aid. Babies on ventilators have died because of the Israeli assault on hospitals, Palestinians are foraging for food from garbage dumps, and around one hundred people were recently killed after Israeli troops opened fire as hungry people rushed toward aid trucks near the Gaza-Israel border.

Israel is facing a case of genocide at the International Court of Justice.

While Palestinian diaspora and its allies are taking out almost-daily protest rallies in different European capitals to draw attention to the Israeli brutalities, European leaders have looked the other way. And some countries like Germany are even sending weapons to Israel.

Samour says Germany is a signatory to the UN Genocide Convention and is legally bound to prevent genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity from taking place.

Article 3 of the convention which directly prohibits complicity in genocide is causing serious worry within German leadership as the country continues weapons sales to Israel, a move that could qualify senior German government officials as complicit in genocide.

However, Samour clarifies that while German leaders do not see Israel's actions as genocide, the German constitution allows provision to prosecute individuals directly involved in or complicit to genocide, war crimes or crimes against humanity.

The law reads, "For offences...that were committed abroad, this Act shall apply independently of the law of the place where the act was committed if the perpetrator is German or if the offence is directed against the Federal Republic of Germany."

Code of Crimes against International Law goes on to elaborate, "an act of aggression is the use of armed force by a State against the sovereignty, territorial integrity or political independence of another State, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Charter of the United Nations".

"Only persons in a position effectively to exercise control over or to direct the political or military action of a State may be party to an offence," the law says.

Samour says the law, passed in 2002, criminalises war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, and therefore can be used to provide justice for families of victims and stop arms sales to Israel.

“Under that law, Germany, has a clear obligation to prevent genocide and German state officials should use their leverage and employ all lawful means at their disposal to influence Israel to refrain from genocidal acts,” says Samour.

So far the German government has been the loudest supporter of Israel in its war and has repeatedly refused to call for a ceasefire.

Germany's arms exports to Israel last year amounted to €326M ($350M), most of which were approved after October 7, a tenfold increase in arms exports to Israel compared to 2022. Weapons bought from Germany make up 28 percent of Israel’s total military imports.

"This is the responsibility of the German state and since the German state isn't taking its responsibility seriously, we are here to remind them that there are no double standards. Palestinian victims deserve justice as other victims worldwide and we are going to hold them accountable," says Samour.

Seeking justice

Nora Ragab, a German-Palestinian who is one of the plaintiffs in the criminal complaint against German politicians, said her uncle living in Gaza lost his life in the Israeli bombings.

Nora says she is deeply fearful of taking legal action and putting her name out in the media because she could be labelled an anti-Semite and likely lose her job. But says she can't be a bystander and wants justice for her uncle.

"We can't be just bystanders watching the genocide unfold on our families and our people in Gaza," she tells TRT World.

"We will try with as many tools as possible which are on our disposal to really put pressure on the government or the actors to put an end to the genocide."

Israel is preparing to launch a ground invasion in Rafah, the city in Gaza, where more than a million Palestinians have taken refuge.

"We can go to the streets, we can protest, but we also think that it's important to take legal action to hold the German government responsible for the actions," says Nora.

She says in several other countries, courts have recently ordered the governments not to sell weapons and to abide by international law.

"I believe in justice, and I also believe in the justice system."

The legal initiative of Gazan families and German lawyers was supported by civil society organisations European Legal Support Center (ELSC), the Palestine Institute for Public Diplomacy (PIPD) and Law for Palestine under the Justice and Accountability for Palestine Initiative.

German leadership has long maintained its 'special responsibility' towards Israel due to the country's Nazi past, However, many Germans are increasingly unhappy with their political leadership's one-sided stance on the Israel-Palestine conflict.

"Our people are being brutally slaughtered, sometimes I feel a sense of helplessness but I hope through this investigation, which hopefully will come, we can also raise awareness among the people in Germany,” says Nora.