Israel Matzav

Dean of Hebrew U law school: Israeli attack on Iran 'illegal' under 'international law'?

The dean of Hebrew University's law school worries that an Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear weapons program would be 'illegal' under 'international law.'

In a recent interview with The Jerusalem Post, the new Hebrew University Law School dean and leading international law expert analyzed a number of dilemmas facing Israel in the realms of international law and security, including in potential future conflicts with Iran and Egypt.

Even when it comes to nuclear weapons, international law would appear only to permit an attack on Iran when an armed attack from Iran is at least imminent, said Shany.

The UN Security Council is supposed to be responsible for security issues that are short of an armed attack, he explained, and “states are not supposed to take things into their own hands” preemptively unless an attack is imminent.

On the other hand, he commented, the Security Council “has failed to perform this duty in many cases” – and in the case of Iran in particular, as none of the international efforts to date have managed to stop what many believe is Iran’s clandestine push for nuclear weapons.

Also, the practice of nations, or what nations do regardless of what conventions actually say – something that often comes up in determining questions of international law – has shown that both Israel and other nations have taken matters of their security into their own hands even prior to an imminent attack when they believed it was necessary, said Shany.

While this past practice does not necessarily make such actions legal – especially since some of the actions have been criticized – as the actions have not brought any real punitive action from the UN Security Council beyond some condemnations, the HU law expert implied that it was hard to say these actions were far beyond the pale.

At the end of the day, Shany, choosing his words carefully, said that although as a lawyer he could not currently say that a preemptive strike on Iran would be lawful, “as someone who lives here,” he could not say that under all circumstances the leadership must refrain from seriously considering such action.

Iran is clearly developing nuclear weapons. The United Nations has done nothing effective about it for more than ten years. Iran has threatened numerous times to wipe Israel off the map and similar expressions. Is Shany saying that we have to wait for the nuclear version of 'seeing the whites of their eyes' before we attack? That seems absurd under these circumstances. I don't see Israel asking the UN's permission to put a stop to this under any circumstances. 

Labels: international law, Iranian nuclear threat, Israeli attack on Iran

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:14 AM