Gabriel Helou

On October 2 nd , 2018, Jamal Khashoggi entered the Saudi Consulate General in Istanbul, Turkey, to pick up marriage documents - wherefrom he never reemerged. He was murdered at the Consulate by a team of 15 members, which included a forensic expert. According to reports, his body was then dismembered. Saudi Arabia’s official version about Khashoggi’s death has changed with each passing day. Nevertheless, all leaks and reports lead to one same conclusion: the killing of Khashoggi was a premeditated murder, ordered by top echelons of the Saudi Monarchy, namely the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman. Today, Turkish President Erdoğan corroborated before the Turkish Parliament that it was pre-planned.  Furthermore, it is unimaginable that the crime was carried out without the prior knowledge of the Saudi Consul. However, the latter could have prevented it, but he never did – regardless of the reasons. In addition to committing murder, violating Khashoggi’s right t...

Source:   ICRC   “Rule 51. Public and Private Property in Occupied Territory Rule 51. In occupied territory: (a) movable public property that can be used for military operations may be confiscated; (b) immovable public property must be administered according to the rule of usufruct; and (c) private property must be respected and may not be confiscated; except where destruction or seizure of such property is required by imperative military necessity. Summary State practice establishes this rule as a norm of customary international law applicable in international armed conflicts. Movable public property The rule that all movable public property that may be used for military operations may be confiscated is a long-standing rule of customary international law already recognized in the Lieber Code, the Brussels Declaration and the Oxford Manual. [1]  It is codified in the Hague Regulations, which provides that the following may be confiscated: “...

“ Abstract:       Since at least the middle of the nineteenth century, two competing conceptions of suffering in wartime have dominated western thought about the laws of armed conflict. One conception views suffering – and especially suffering in war – as an evil in itself. Those who take this view, like Henri Dunant, founder of the International Committee of the Red Cross and inspiration for the Geneva Convention of 1864, typically adopt the minimization of suffering as the principal goal for a law of war. Another conception of suffering in war, however, sees the experience of pain as an inevitable and sometimes even ennobling accompaniment to the hard work of bringing about just ends in the world. This latter view rejects the idea that one can evaluate suffering or its legal significance without knowing why the suffering exists. This approach has a long tradition, too, one that stretches back through Dunant’s contemporary the Prussian-American Francis Liebe...