Celebrating the victory of Donald Trump in November last year, Israel’s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich pledged that 2025 would be the year that the Israeli Occupation Forces completed their annexation of the West Bank. “The only way to remove the threat of a Palestinian state from the agenda,” said Smotrich, “is to apply Israeli sovereignty over the settlements in Judea and Samaria [biblical names for the West Bank].”

Hours after Trump took office and days after the Gaza ceasefire came into effect, Israel launched Operation Iron Wall. Settler attacks erupted across the Occupied Territories. 17 people, including two-year-old Laila Al-Khatib, were killed in the city of Jenin, where more than 60 homes were demolished. On Wednesday evening, in the northern town of Tamoun, an Israeli drone strike claimed a further 10 lives.

In Washington, the new administration wasted little time in offering its support to this escalating campaign of ethnic cleansing. Having removed the handful of US sanctions imposed on illegal Israeli settlements, the White House has now promised to “deport” those international students engaged in Palestine solidarity activity on college campuses. Donald Trump has picked up where Joe Biden left off, pledging to “clean out” the Gaza Strip’s entire population and threatening all those who stand in the Occupation’s way.

Once again, however, the barbarity of imperialism is matched only by the determined resilience of the oppressed. Scenes of jubilation and tearful reunions unfolded across the Gaza Strip this week as hundreds of thousands of displaced people marched back to their homes in the north of the enclave.

The return of the Palestinian people to their land, with the hope of humanity on their back, demands a renewed international effort to hold their oppressors accountable. That’s why, on 31 January, nine nations — collectively known as The Hague Group — gathered in The Hague to coordinate legal, diplomatic and economic measures against Israel’s violations of international law.

Convened by the Progressive International, the meeting between state representatives of Belize, Bolivia, Colombia, Cuba, Honduras, Malaysia, Namibia, Senegal and South Africa explores collective action at both national and international levels to further the cause of Palestinian liberation.

The statement adopted following the meeting commits states to:

1. Uphold the arrest warrants issued against Israeli officials by the International Criminal Court;
2. Prevent provision or transfer of arms, munitions and related equipment to Israel, where there is a clear risk that they might be used to violate international law; and
3. Prevent the docking of vessels at any of their ports where there is a risk of the vessel being used to carry military fuel and weaponry to Israel.

You can read the full text of the statement here.

Today’s crucial meeting in the City of Peace and Justice was borne of necessity. Israel’s genocide in Gaza — documented by international courts and condemned by global civil society — has been met with impunity, enabled by Western bombs and bullets. Following Washington’s imposition of sanctions on the International Criminal Court, the very institutions designed to uphold justice and accountability now face punishment for daring to preserve international law.

“Israel’s violations go beyond the mass murder and persecution of Palestinians,” Anwar Ibrahim, Prime Minister of Malaysia, told the Guardian ahead of the gathering. “They strike at the very foundations of international law, which the global community has a duty to defend.”

You can watch the meeting in The Hague (live-streamed from 1430 UTC on 31 January) by clicking here.

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