JOHANNESBURG, May 24 (Xinhua) -- The South African government on Friday welcomed the order handed down by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) which asks Israel to immediately halt its military operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

The ICJ's order came as South Africa requested the court on May 10 to deliver a ruling on the modification and the indication of provisional measures against Israel concerning the application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in the Gaza Strip.

"We are gravely concerned that Israel has restricted necessary levels of aid from entering Gaza and has systematically targeted aid infrastructure within Gaza," South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said in a statement. "This case is thus focused on the ordinary Palestinians in Gaza who are now facing their seventh month of suffering through collective punishment for something for which they have no individual responsibility."

Palestinians continue to die of starvation, many of them children, and hundreds of thousands are under imminent threat of death because a deliberate decision has been taken by Israel to starve Palestinians by denying them food, the statement said.

"Israel is obliged to implement the court's order, as well as the previous orders of Jan. 26 and March 28. Similarly, under international law, the prohibition on genocide is a peremptory norm from which no derogation is permitted, for any reason whatsoever," said Ramaphosa. Enditem

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