Nicaragua on Friday accused Germany before the UN’s top judicial institution of facilitating the perpetration of “genocide” of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip by supporting Israel and suspending funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. (UNRWA).

The Central American country filed a lawsuit against Germany “due to the alleged breach of its obligations under the international Convention for the Prevention and Suppression of the Crime of Genocide” (1948), the UN International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague explained in the bulletin Press published.

In December, South Africa also appealed to the ICJ, arguing that Israel’s military operations in the Gaza Strip violated the Convention on the Prevention of Genocide.

The Hague tribunal has yet to rule on the matter, but on January 26 it ordered Israel to “take all measures within its power” to prevent genocide being committed in the Palestinian enclave.

Nicaragua argues, according to the ICC, that there is a “known risk of genocide of the Palestinian people and, above all, of the population of the Gaza Strip.”

Germany, by providing political, economic and military support to Israel and suspending UNRWA funding, “facilitates this genocide” and “in any case, fails to fulfill its obligation to do everything to prevent it.”

Along with the US, Germany is among the top arms exporters to Israel, according to UN experts.

The war between Israel and Hamas broke out on October 7, triggered by an unprecedented raid by the Palestinian Islamist movement’s military arm in southern Israel, which killed more than 1,160 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on in official Israeli data.

In retaliation, Israel has vowed to “wipe out” Hamas, in power in the Gaza Strip since 2007, which it, like the US and the EU, describes as a “terrorist” organization. In the shelling and then in the ground operations of the Israeli army since then, more than 30,000 people have lost their lives in the Gaza Strip, the vast majority of them women and children, according to the Health Ministry of Hamas.

According to the UN, in the enclave, under Israeli siege since October 9, 2.2 million people, the vast majority of the population, are at risk of starvation, especially in the north, where the distribution of humanitarian aid is virtually impossible due to the disasters , of battles and looting.

After Israel alleged that UNRWA staff were involved in the October 7 attack, more than ten countries, including its main donors, notably the US, Germany, Britain and Sweden, announced they were suspending UNRWA funding until further notice.