Our partners at Asymmetrical Haircuts were in a post-punk witty mood when they released this new and timely podcast. They played with Joy Division’s cult song and called this program: “Law Will Tear U.S. Apart Again.” That was a good one.
Janet Anderson and Stephanie van den Berg are asking the big question of the day with the advent of the new Trump administration in the United States: Is international law still relevant? They invited Oona Hathaway, professor at Yale Law School, executive editor at JustSecurity, and author of “The Internationalists” to share her analysis. She discusses Trump’s proposal to take over Gaza, remove its entire Palestinian population to wherever, and transform it into a luxurious “riveria”. Egypt and Jordan have not welcomed the idea of taking 2 million Palestinians, as Trump has suggested them. But how many laws would such move break? Many, says Hathaway. Because it would break the most basic prohibitions that have governed the world since 1945. “It’s a stunning suggestion,” she says. “It suggests that unthinkable things are thinkable. And it puts on the table the possibility of committing these really horrendous crimes. It’s destructive to the international order.”
Since 1945, Hathaway reminds us that we have lived in a world where war was outlawed. That was “an outlandish idea that was remarkably successful in the end” since conquest has always been the order of the day. “We’re seeing how fragile that was. If Trump acts on some of the threats that he’s made, that is a true disintegration of the rule of law at the international level,” she warns.
ASYMMETRICAL HAIRCUTS
This podcast has been published as part of a partnership between Justice Info and Asymmetrical Haircuts, a podcast on international justice produced from The Hague by journalists Janet Anderson and Stephanie van den Berg, who retain full control and independence over the contents of the podcast.
