William Schabas is a Canadian law professor who has previously served as the chief of a United Nations (UN) commission which was tasked with investigating accusations of war crimes following the 2014 war between Hamas and Israel, a move criticized by Israel and Canada, pointing to Schabas’ past anti-Israel views, including his refusal to call Hamas a terrorist organization.

Schabas has been described by The Globe & Mail as being “outspoken in his criticism of Israel and (who) previously offered consultancy services to the Palestinian Liberation Organization” (PLO).

Notwithstanding his checkered and controversial background regarding Israel, Schabas was the guest on the January 15 episode of Frontburner, a CBC radio program, “Israel faces genocide case at UN’s top court,” where the pair discussed South Africa’s recent genocide accusations against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague.

During the program’s introduction, Fairless described Schabas as being “a Canadian academic who knows the intricacies of this law and who’s been recognized with the Order of Canada as one of the foremost international authorities on genocide.”

During the 27 minute interview, Schabas presented South Africa’s arguments at the ICJ, which he described in positive terms, saying “One would like to think that South Africa also is that there’s a nobility about doing this, and that South Africa as the regime that emerged from apartheid, they’ve been fond of quoting Nelson Mandela, saying that until Palestine is free, we will not be free.”

Listen to the full episode below:

Schabas did not acknowledge, and Fairless never pointed out, that South Africa’s motivation on challenging alleged genocide is quite selective; in 2015, the country warmly welcomed Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, whom the International Criminal Court (ICC) described as a “fugitive on genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity in Darfur.” The ICC had issued an arrest warrant for al-Bashir, which South Africa then promptly ignored.

Regarding South Africa’s charges, Schabas said that “in a case like this, it’s quite straightforward. South Africa should succeed in getting an order from the court” to demand a halt to Israel’s counter-terrorism operations.

Schabas argued that in the current war in the Gaza Strip, “Israel’s demonstrated that it’s incapable of applying international law in terms of distinguishing between civilians and protecting civilians in an armed conflict and focusing exclusively on combatants, as it’s supposed to do under international law.”

Providing no evidence beyond rhetoric to buttress his scandalous accusation, Schabas failed to share that Israel has taken extensive steps to minimize civilian casualties in the Gaza Strip, ranging from actively warning Gazans prior to air strikes, sending Israeli soldiers to fight in close quarters (where hundreds have died), rather than relying exclusively on air power, as well as evacuating Palestinians from areas of particularly heavy fighting.

In his comments, Schabas said that “an unprecedented percentage of victims are non-combatant civilians,” and that “the siege of the Gaza Strip so that necessities of life, food, medicine, potable water, power and so on are not allowed in,” have been cited as evidence of genocide.

There is no evidence to support Schabas’ claim that “an unprecedented percentage of victims are non-combatant victims,” given that in other conflicts, as many as 90 per cent of casualties are civilians, nor his allegation that “the necessities of life” are “not allowed in” Gaza, given that hundreds of trucks with humanitarian aid enter the strip every day, and many more could enter if the United Nations and Egypt facilitate an increase.

Schabas’ ability to be an impartial judge regarding genocide has been questioned before. In 2019, he was slammed by a human rights activist for defending the government of Myanmar against genocide accusations, who wrote that “Schabas is basically selling out the Rohingya for some Myanmar gov’t $$$. Really the worst sort of behaviour, how totally immoral and two-faced.”

William Schabas has a long anti-Israel history which went entirely unsaid during the program, and Fairless failed to properly challenge his guest, even when he made outlandish and indefensible statements.