Newly-elected UN court president wished Israel ‘unhappy birthday’ for ‘years of occupation’

The International Court of Justice, the primary judicial arm of the United Nations based in The Hague, announced on Tuesday that Nawaf Salam was elected president of the court.

A judge and former Lebanese ambassador to the United Nations, Salam has been a member of the ICJ since 2018. He was one of the judges who heard South Africa’s case against Israel, accusing the Jewish state of genocide in Gaza.

Salam has a history of anti-Israel comments on social media.

“Unhappy birthday to you,” he wrote on June 5, 2015, tagging Israel and noting “48 years of occupation.” Some four months later, he wrote that “Israel must stop violence and end occupation.”

“When we criticize and condemn Israel it is never because of the Jewish character of the majority of its population,” he claimed on Jan. 22, 2015. On the same day, he wrote that “Portraying the critics of Israel’s policies as antisemites is an attempt to intimidate and discredit them, which we reject.”

On Sept. 10 of the same year, he added, “Palestine’s full membership in U.N. and ending Israel’s occupation remain long overdue.”