California District Court Finds Biden May Have Aided in Genocide And Dismisses Injunction to Stop It

On November 13, the Defense for Children International Palestine, along with ten other individuals sued Joe Biden, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, for their roles in enabling Israel to carry out the most devastating genocide in the 21^st century, against the Palestinian people.

This lawsuit was filed in United States District Court for the Northern District of California. That court is based in Oakland.

The filing charged Biden, Austin, and Blinken with failing to meet their legal “obligation to prevent genocide” in Palestine, as required under the 1948 Genocide Convention to which the United States, Israel, and Palestine are all signatories. It further asked the court to order the trio immediately to “take all measures within their power to prevent Israel’s commission of genocidal acts against the Palestinian people of Gaza”.

The suit also called for the court to enjoin the three defendants “from aiding, abetting, enabling, or facilitating Israel’s commission of genocidal acts against the Palestinian people of Gaza.” Among the acts the suit asked the court to order the U.S. officials to stop were:

“Providing, facilitating, or coordinating military assistance or financing to Israel;”

“Initiating, acting upon, continuing, expediting, or completing sales, transfers, or delivery of weapons and arms to Israel;”

“Providing military equipment and personnel, advancing Israel’s commission of genocidal acts.”

“Obstructing attempts by the international community, including the United Nations, to implement a ceasefire in Gaza, and to lift the siege on Gaza.”

In the last demand, the suit was referring to the United States’ series of vetoes on any resolution brought before the UN Security Council ordering an immediate cessation of hostilities in Gaza.

Hearings in the case took place on January 26.  The testimony lasted over two hours.

One of those who spoke was a Palestinian immigrant living in Fairfield, California, who spoke of the horror of learning seven members of his family had been murdered in Israeli airstrikes in Gaza, using military equipment and munitions provided by the United States government. A second individual, this time from San Ramon, California, detailed the shock and brutality of losing 100 family members during Israel’s mass genocide of the Palestinian people. This person spoke also of how just one Israeli aerial assault, with indiscriminate and unjustified shelling and bombing, resulted in the deaths of this man’s cousin and nephew, and 14 others from a family nearby.

Those who took the witness stand told of the terror of what Israel had done, without provocation or cause, in between alternating cries of anger and grief.

The testimony also outlined how what Israel had done met the legal definition of genocide as prescribed in the 1948 Genocide Convention. It also explained how the United States and the trio of federal officials charged in this case were guilty of complicity in Israel’s genocidal acts, should be ordered to stop aiding Israel in those crimes, and must shift to do everything in their power to bring an end to the slaughter there.

The hearings in this U.S. domestic proceeding also had the benefit of taking place just hours after United Nations’ International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled on charges brought by South Africa that Israel was guilty of genocide under the 1948 Convention and should order Israel to stop the war immediately. In that case, while the ICJ concluded the evidence presented pointed to Israel only potentially being guilty of genocide without ordering a ceasefire, it did give provisional orders directing Israel to prevent that genocide from continuing while telling the country to punish those who either cause genocide or incite others to do it, all the while citing evidence South Africa brought forth in its proof that Israel was already well on its way to wiping out the Palestinian people in Gaza. The ICJ also ordered Israel to preserve further evidence of genocide or its incitement, and to ensure increased flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza.

All those ICJ orders were effective immediately. All were ignored by Israel. The response by the countries controlled by Israel was to double down on the genocide by cutting funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) and continue financial and military support. 

Few legal experts believed the plaintiffs would win their case. The U.S. Constitution and past legal precedents support the President, head of the State Department, and Secretary of Defense having substantial leeway to carry out policies as they see fit, despite the carnage they may cause even – and especially, in this case – by just aiding and abetting those who might cause genocide. Perhaps the laws of the land which allow for this should be changed, but for now those are the laws which the judge in this matter had to consider in making his decision in the matter.

The reality is that the government of the U.S. is not really accountable to the people and occupants of the White House are given license to engage in whatever horrific crimes they want. They are also free to commit treason by serving foreign masters. 

In his decision on the U.S. case filed by Defense for Children International Palestine and the ten other plaintiffs against Biden, Austin, and Blinken, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey S. White leaned heavily on the International Court of Justice decision by reference, but in the end ruled his court did not have the jurisdiction to enjoin the President, Secretary of Defense, or Secretary of State for what indeed could be genocidal-complicit actions carried out via Israel on the Palestinian people in Gaza.

In that ruling, Judge White first explained that the “International Court of Justice … found that the ‘acts and omissions complained of … appear to be capable of falling within the provisions of the Genocide Convention’.”

It also quoted the ICJ backing up that finding with its statement that “the military operation being conducted by Israel following the attack of 7 October 2023 has resulted in a large number of deaths and injuries, as well as the massive destruction of homes, forcible displacement of the vast majority of the population, and extensive damage to civilian infrastructure.”

The quote incorporated in White’s ruling continued, incorporating the ICJ’s observation that, “While figures relating to the Gaza Strip cannot be independently verified, recent information indicates that 25,700 Palestinians have been killed, over 63,000 injuries have been reported, over 360,000 housing units have been destroyed or partially damaged and approximately 1.7 million persons have been internally displaced.”

Judge White then summarized his own position on the matter, based both on what was presented before his court and what was brought before the International Court of Justice.

"The undisputed evidence before this Court comports with the finding of the ICJ," he wrote "Both the uncontroverted testimony of the plaintiffs and the expert opinion proffered at the hearing on these motions as well as statements made by various officers of the Israeli government indicate that the ongoing military siege in Gaza is intended to eradicate a whole people and therefore plausibly falls within the international prohibition against genocide."

Despite the seriousness of that judgment, Judge White ended up ruling against the plaintiffs, not because he disagreed that the defendants might be guilty of the charges levied against them, but that his court lacked the jurisdiction to rule against them on the matter.

“There are rare cases in which the preferred outcome is inaccessible to the court. This is one of those cases,” the judge wrote.

“The court is bound by precedent and the division of our coordinate branches of government to abstain from exercising jurisdiction in this matter,” he continued.

In the ruling document he stated the issue even more clearly.

 “The Court finds that the claims alleged here raise fundamentally non-justiciable political questions,” he wrote. “At its core, the political question doctrine is concerned with the separation of powers between the separate branches of government, and limits jurisdiction of the courts to ‘cases and controversies’.”

Unfortunately for the plaintiffs, the Judge explained, the power of his court is insufficient to allow it to rule against Biden, Blinken, and Austin.

“Because any determination to challenge the decision of the executive branch of government on support of Israel is fraught with serious political questions, the claims presented by plaintiffs here lie outside the court’s limited jurisdiction,” the Judge said.

While that might have been the end of it, Judge White did use the opportunity of his ruling to issue a warning shot of sorts across the bow of the federal government and the three principal architects of its policy of unconditional support for the ongoing genocide.

"This court implores defendants to examine the results of their unflagging support of the military siege against the Palestinians in Gaza," he wrote.

Katherine Gallagher, Center for Constitutional Rights senior attorney who presented the plaintiffs’ case before the Northern District of California court, expressed frustration with the judge’s decision while supporting the ruling’s plea for the Biden administration to halt its support of the bloodbath in Gaza.

“While we strongly disagree with the court’s ultimate jurisdictional ruling, we urge the Biden administration to heed the judge’s call to examine and end its deadly course of action,” she said.

Diala Shamas, another senior staff attorney with the Center for Constitutional Rights expanded on that, calling the District Court ruling “far from a win for the U.S. government.”

“It is unprecedented and damning that a federal court has all but affirmed that Israel is committing a genocide while criticizing defendants Biden, Blinken, and Austin's 'unflagging' support for the acts that constitute that genocide," she said.

Stopping the genocidal monsters in Washington will require other measures.