Intervenção do Min. Mauro Vieira em reunião pela interrupção do genocídio em Gaza, convocada pelo Grupo da Haia - Nova York, 26 de setembro de 2025

Excellencies,

A genocide is underway in Gaza.

The Palestinian people, when not directly executed, are being deliberately condemned to hunger, destitution, and death.

By March 2025, over 50,000 Palestinian children and adolescents had been killed or injured in Gaza.

Famine has been weaponized, placing hundreds of thousands at nutritional risk – including 132,000 children under five, 41,000 of whom are in critical condition.

Only 1.5% of Gaza’s land remains suitable for agriculture. Nearly 80% of infrastructure and 92% of homes have been damaged or destroyed, leaving 1.35 million people without adequate shelter.

Yet Israel maintains an unlawful blockade on humanitarian aid and the obstruction of the work of the United Nations. Two Brazilian members of parliament integrate the flotilla, together with 15 other Brazilian nationals, an initiative of the civil society to break the siege against Gaza. Their safety must be preserved and Brazil is closely monitoring their activities.

Therefore, Brazil congratulates the Hague Group for its effort to mobilize international support for ending the genocide of the Palestinian population.

Excellencies,

International law requires States not only to refrain from committing genocide, but also to prevent it. Failure to do so may give rise to State responsibility, including for complicity in genocide.

Time has come for States to fulfil their obligations under the Genocide Convention by adopting effective measures to ensure that they do not, directly or indirectly, collaborate with its perpetrators.

At the High-Level Conference on the Implementation of the Two-State Solution, President Lula announced concrete measures:

• The investigation and tighter control of imports from illegal settlements;

• The continued denial of defence exports to Israel;
• The support for an UN-led international verification mission to monitor compliance with international law and a mechanism modeled after the Special Committee against apartheid;

• Technical support for the Palestinian Authority and continued support for UNRWA’s activities;

• Ensuring a principled distinction between legitimate criticism of state policies and practices affecting Palestinians and antisemitism. 

Excellencies,

Last week, Brazil officially submitted its intervention in the ICJ case brought by South Africa under the Genocide Convention.

We did so guided not only by a legal duty, but by a profound sense of responsibility to uphold the absolute prohibition of genocide and to ensure that the Convention retains its full protective power.

Brazil firmly believes that genocide must be understood in its true complexity – as a composite crime, revealed not only by isolated acts, but by systematic patterns of conduct that, taken together, demonstrate the intent to destroy a people, in whole or in part.

In this context, Brazil rejects the misuse of self-defense as a pretext for illegal actions. Self-defense has no application in the context of an illegal occupation and cannot serve to obscure the Court’s duty to assess whether the systematic violence inflicted on Palestinians in Gaza reveal genocidal intent.

That is the message Brazil brings to The Hague – a message of law, of justice, and of humanity.

Excellencies,

All States must ensure that their domestic legal and institutional frameworks give full effect to the universal principles of human rights, self-determination of peoples, and respect for international law.

This requires aligning national policies with international obligations, including the Geneva Conventions, Resolution ES-10/23 (2024), and the International Court of Justice’s 2024 Advisory Opinion.

We must turn indignation into action, law into justice, and justice into peace.

Thank you.