Palestine as a Non-Member Observer State at the United Nations I.6: Palestine’s Ratification of the Statute of the International Court of Justice The new status of Palestine as a UN observer state enhances its opportunity to sign up to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) statutes, where Articles 93 and 96 of the UN Charter state: “All Members of the United Nations are ipso facto parties to the Statute of the International Court of Justice, and a state which is not a Member of the United Nations may become a party to the Statute of the International Court of Justice on conditions to be determined in each case by the General Assembly upon the recommendation of the Security Council. Also, the General Assembly or the Security Council may request the International Court of Justice to give an advisory opinion on any legal question and other organs of the United Nations and specialized agencies, which may at any time be so authorized by the General Assembly, may also request advisory opinions of the Court on legal questions arising within the scope of their activities”. Switzerland and Japan have undergone this experience before becoming members of the United Nations. The General Assembly, upon recommendation by the Security Council, recognized the conditions which an applicant state needed to meet in order to sign onto the ICJ statutes. The same conditions were required every time a similar case arose: commitment to the statute of the court, commitment to Article 94 of the United Nations Charter, which states that each Member of the United Nations undertakes to comply with the decision of the International Court of Justice in any case to which it is a party, and contribution to the expenses of the court according to the rate assessed by the General Assembly. If Palestine takes this step, it will guarantee the same judicial mechanisms to which member states in the United Nations have access34, such as recourse to the ICJ. It will also be able to request from the Court advisory opinions on certain matters, such as racial discrimination, without the need for Israel’s consent. It can also request from the Court advisory opinions on the status of long term occupation. It is worth mentioning that the advisory opinion issued by the ICJ on 9 July 2004 on the legal consequences of the construction of the separation wall in the occupied Palestinian territory states that the construction of the wall is contrary to international humanitarian law. Articles 36, 35, 34 of the statute of the ICJ state there is jurisdiction of the Court over all the cases which litigants bring to it, including matters stated particularly in the Charter, conventions and agreements in force and all the legal disputes which break out between it and a state party to it. The court has two forms of jurisdiction: i) Contentious (Optional) Jurisdiction of the Court: this is based on or requires the consent of the parties involved that they agree to the Court’s jurisdiction in the matter being brought before the Court. 34 Dr. Kameel Mansour, Palestinian options in the United Nations, see: http://www.palestine-studies.org/files/ document_18.pdf 17