More than 100 experts in international law have signed a letter in which they argue that the United States’ attacks on Iran may constitute war crimes and violations of international law.
The United States’ conduct of war in Iran and statements from the country’s top leadership “raise serious concerns about violations of international human rights law and humanitarian law, including potential war crimes”. (NTB-Reuters)
But it becomes particularly meaningless to speak of international law when it concerns an attack on Iran, which uses terrorist groups such as Hamas, Hizbollah and the Houthi movement as proxy fighters.
Women in Iran, half of the population, are deprived of all rights. People belonging to other religions, such as Christians and Baháʼís, are fair game. Rape, torture and the killing of people who may be imprisoned merely because they wore the hijab in the “wrong” way are not uncommon. And in January, 30,000–40,000 demonstrators were slaughtered in Iranian streets.
The so-called experts also maintain that attacks on infrastructure used by civilians – such as bridges, power plants and water treatment facilities – may constitute war crimes. Even threats of such actions are violations of international law, it is claimed.
The Trump administration has on several occasions threatened powerful attacks on power plants and water treatment facilities, including on 13 March and during the night to Friday.
“Our military, the largest and most powerful in the entire world, has not even begun to destroy anything that still remains in Iran. Bridges will be next, and then power stations,” President Donald Trump wrote during the night to Friday.
Admittedly, bridges are used by civilians, but this type of infrastructure constitutes legitimate military targets, since they are also used for the transport of military equipment and personnel. Attacks that seek to prevent the terrorist state of Iran from developing nuclear weapons are, of course, also entirely legitimate.
How many attacks against Israel does Iran stand behind? How many Israeli civilians have the tyrants in Tehran contributed to killing? Such details do not appear to concern these experts.
The experts also point to a statement from Trump in January in which he said that he “does not need international law”. Of course, the United States does not need international law, since all potential enemies ignore this Western construct without hesitation.
Perhaps the experts should instead focus on civil rights, which are a dying provision in what we previously knew as “Western democracies”. We now live under political leaders who have opened the borders to non-Western migrants who are responsible for massive crime and most of the terrorism we are subjected to.
Since few of those who arrive here have the ability or willingness to support themselves, ordinary taxpayers must finance the downfall of our own nation, while freedom of expression, security and democracy are taken from us.
On 13 March, Trump is said to have stated that the United States could attack Iran “for fun”. This causes the experts to react. Are they not aware that the United States and Israel began their attack on Iran two weeks earlier, on 28 February?
But these lovers of dialogue, with as much faith as Espen Barth Eide in dialogue as a solution to problems with tyrannical regimes such as Iran, are of course very concerned with “rhetoric”.
– We are deeply concerned about the dangerous rhetoric used by officials during the war, the experts write.
– We are deeply concerned that the conduct and threats outlined here lead to serious harm to civilians in the Middle East, and that they contribute to escalating the conflict, damaging the environment and the global economy, and that they risk undermining the rule of law and fundamental norms that protect civilians in all countries.
One can scarcely believe what one reads. Do these experts mean that Iran has anything resembling “the rule of law and fundamental norms that protect all of its civilians”?
It is apparently impossible for self-appointed “experts” to understand the most obvious point:
The greatest threat to Iranian civilians is neither the United States nor Israel, but the Iranians’ own oppressors in Tehran.
The regime relies on its own military forces, such as the Revolutionary Guard and the paramilitary Basij force. Both of these units were established by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979 as protection for the religious dictatorship against Iran’s regular armed forces.
In addition, there is the Iranian morality police, who ride around on motorcycles hunting young women who wear the hijab incorrectly, so that they can be beaten and worse. But that, presumably, is entirely acceptable to these experts in international law.