”How could this be? How could offenders have been so thoroughly deprived of their citizenship status and the rights that typically accompany it? Perhaps, because we have become convinced that certain offenders, once they offend, are no longer ‘members of the public’ and cease to be deserving of the kinds of consideration we typically afford…
Children of a lesser God? Sacrificing Palestinian Children in the name of ‘self-defence’
The death toll in Gaza climbed exponentially as Israel continued its relentless airstrikes of civilian communities in Gaza city, killing at least 212 people, including 61 children, destroying 132 buildings and leaving 2,500 homeless. ; while in Israel itself at least 10 people had been killed as a result of Hamas firing 3,300 rockets towards…
An Apartheid State or the only Democracy in the Middle East? An Empirical Inquiry
Abstract This paper argues that Israel’s continuing occupation and military rule of the West Bank since 1967 and its ongoing siege of Gaza since 2007 constitute the International Crime of Apartheid, a Crime against humanity which the State of South Africa practised from 1948 until the 1990s. Drawing analogical similarities between the South African and…
Seeing with unseeing eyes: Evangelical Zionism’s indifference towards the oppression of the Palestinians
Image by dozemode by Pixabay Abstract This paper examines the underlying justifications for Evangelical Christian Zionism’s indifference towards the Israeli occupation of Gaza, West bank and East Jerusalem since the 1967 war and the impetus such indifference provides in supporting the Israeli Government’s continuing oppression of the Palestinian People. It considers the Evangelical claim by…
An ongoing genocide in Gaza
Revisionist Zionism’s settler colonialist ideology: Contributing to an ongoing genocide in Gaza (This is an edited version of an original dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of MA in Human Rights and Global Ethics at the School of History, Politics and International Relations, University of Leicester, September 2019) ABSTRACT This…
An Apartheid State or the only Democracy in the Middle East? An Empirical Inquiry
Originally posted on Essays on Human Rights , Law and International Relations:
Abstract? This paper argues that Israel’s continuing occupation and military rule of the West Bank since 1967 and its ongoing siege of Gaza since 2007 constitute the International Crime of Apartheid, a Crime against humanity which the State of South Africa practised from 1948…
Cambodia’s lost souls
Originally posted on Essays on Human Rights , Law and International Relations:
Photo by James Wheeler on Pexels.com My recent visit to Phnom Penh in Cambodia and the outlying killing fields at Choeung Ek Genocidal Centre stirred unsettling emotions; emotions not very different from those that overwhelm me whenever I cast my mind on the historical…
Are Secret Trusts valid Testamentary dispositions?
Exploring the theroretical justifications for the enforcement of secret trusts The Wills Act 1837, s.9 requires that all testatmentary dispositions be in writing and signed by the Testator, in the presence of two or more attesting witnesses present at the same time. Despite the existence of such statutory formalities, Testators who wish to create a…
Conceptualizing Backwards Tracing: a paradigm for vindicating the property rights of another
The case of Durant (2015) involved a payment of bribes totalling US$10.5 million into a bank account; while at about the same time a total of US$13.5 million had been paid out of that account to the defendants. Yet, the the Privy Council held that all the bribes could be traced to the defendant. The material facts…
Delving into the ‘lived experiences’ of Criminality
Exploring the Criticisms of Rational Choice Theory and Sociological, Psychological Positivism Rational actor theory has been criticized by Cultural criminologists for its overemphasis on the individual’s exercise of free choice in committing crime, while psychological and sociological explanations tend to portray the criminal as one who is predestined to commit crime due to his or…
Genocide and the Psychology of evil
Exploring the psychology behind genocide or mass atrocity; Do mass killers such as genocidaires and terrorists think differently from those who commit petty crimes? It is difficult to support the proposition that all criminals think alike since the motivations and ideas behind the atrocities that mass killers or genocidaires inflict on their victims seem vastly…
Are War Crimes being committed in Ukraine? Holding perpetrators accountable for atrocities
The ICC’s decision to open an investigation into possible war crimes commited in Ukraine The International Criminal Court (ICC) Prosecutor, Karim A.A. Khan Q, recently announced his decision to open an investigation into possible war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the ongoing Ukraine war waged by Russia. Although Ukraine is not a signatory…
Conceiving Punishment as Moral Justice
This essay argues that although penological philosophies of punishment justifying judiciallysanctioned imprisonment, corporal punishment and the death penalty appear coherentin themselves, they are contradictory when relied upon as a whole or in relation to eachother. These philosophies of pain when applied in the real world fail to justify and legitimate the livedrealities of contemporary technologies…
Equity and Trusts: Conceptual and Evidential uncertainty (Part II)
In our previous analysis of Trusts powers we considered Lord Wilberforce’s interpretation of Bertram Baden’s deed in McPhail v Doulton as ‘establishing a fund to provide benefits for the staff of a company and their relatives and dependants‘. (McPhail v Doulton [1971] A.C. 424). His Lordship concluded that Baden’s deed did not evince a mere…
Ratko Mladic’s Genocide conviction: A Vindication of the Rights of Victims in the Srebrenica massacre
A Century of Impunity? The 20th century’s morbid legacy of death and despair did not end with the First World War and the Shoah: the Holocaust claiming the lives of more than 6 million Jews and millions more Gypsies, disabled people and others deemed undesirable to Hitler and the Nazi State; Just decades later in…
Essays on Human Rights , Law and International Relations 