In December 2023, South Africa instituted proceedings against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Genocide Convention). To date, ten third-party interventions have been submitted in the case. Eight states—Bolivia, Chile, Turkey, Spain, Mexico, Libya, Colombia, and the Maldives—have filed declarations of intervention under Article 63 of the ICJ Statute as state parties to the Genocide Convention. Nicaragua has requested permission to intervene under Article 62, asserting a legal interest which may be affected by the ICJ’s decision. Palestine, having acceded to the Genocide Convention in April 2014, has sought to intervene under both articles. As both Articles 62 and 63 provide for interventions by ‘states’, Palestine’s requests (particularly under Article 62), may raise the question of whether it qualifies as a ‘state’ for the purposes of the ICJ Statute—as an antecendent determination for the acceptance of its intervention requests.
