Appeals Court in the Hague Orders Netherlands to Halt Fighter Jet Part Shipments to Israel

In December 2023, the Dutch affiliate of Oxfam (Oxfam Novib),Vredesbeweging PAX Nederland, and The Rights Forum filed suit against the Netherlands on the grounds that the parts the Dutch government had been shipping to Israel might be used to commit international human rights violations.

That case was filed in a District Court in The Hague.

It specifically challenged a decision by the Dutch Minister of Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation not to revoke the license to ship these weapons parts to Israel, even after a thorough review of how Israel was making use of the weapons these parts helped remain operational.

The basis for the lawsuit lay in that the Netherlands is a signatory to international laws which block such shipments, along with the indisputable fact that Israel was using its U.S.-build Lockheed-Martin F-35 fighter jets for a mass genocidal assault on the Palestinian people in Gaza.

There is a similar law in the United States, but it is currently being ignored by the corrupted lawmakers, the Justice Department, and the White House, while Israel proceeds to use the military supplies shipped to it from the U.S. to support the destruction of most buildings and the murders of over 28,000 people now in Gaza.

In the first ruling on this by a lower court in the Netherlands, that court agreed with the plaintiffs’ argument that the spare parts were probably being used to violate international human rights law in Israel’s assault on Gaza.

That was as far as that ruling went, however, with that court refusing to support the request to order the Dutch government to halt future shipments of those parts. It justified letting the government get away with the shipments by saying the government should always be allowed considerable leeway in issues regarding economic as well as political issues, and that the law should not override that leeway. In other words, war profiteering and subservience to Israel is far more important than the lives of Palestinians.

The plaintiffs appealed the idiotic decision to the appeals court at The Hague. In the decision passed down yesterday, that court upheld the finding by the lower court that the parts were probably use to violate international human rights laws. But it overturned the second part, declaring that money and politics should never carry more weight than human rights violations do with respect to the existing law.

The Hague appeals court’s ruling was brief, damning in its criticism of Israel in its humanitarian law violations, and equally so against the Dutch government for its role in supporting Israel in its war crimes.

The plaintiffs “disagree with the decision of the Minister not to block the export of F-35 parts to Israel,” the appeals court wrote in its decision. “According to Oxfam Novib, Israel violates international humanitarian law. Oxfam Novib demands that the court orders the State to stop the export of F-35 parts from the Netherlands to Israel.”

Its ruling is included below in full.

“The court agrees with Oxfam Novib,” it wrote.

“The court finds that there is a clear risk that Israel’s F-35 fighter jets might be used in the commission of serious violations of international humanitarian law. Israel does not take sufficient account of the consequences of its attacks for the civilian population. Israel’s attacks on Gaza have resulted in a disproportionate number of civilian casualties, including thousands of children.

“The Netherlands is a party to several international regulations which stipulate that if a clear risk of serious violations of international humanitarian law exists, the Netherlands has the obligation to prevent the export of military equipment. This means that the export of F-35 parts from the Netherlands to Israel has to be stopped. By deciding that the export license for deliveries of F-35 parts to Israel should not be revoked, the Minister has failed to comply with this international obligation of the Netherlands.

“The court orders the State to stop the export of F-35 parts to Israel within 7 days.”

The Dutch government is appealing the decision to its country’s Supreme Court while sending as many parts as it can before the deadline. The current ruling, however, still goes into effect on February 19, exactly seven days from the ruling date. 

One wildcard in this case is that even though the F-35 spare parts are stored in a secure military cache in the Netherlands, they are owned by the U.S. government. If the Supreme Court were to uphold the decision of The Hague appeals court, one way the Netherlands could get around the court decision would be to simply allow the U.S. to move the parts out of the Netherlands to wherever they may choose, which may happen soon if the parts are actually needed to sustain the slaughter of innocents.