A German government spokesperson said Berlin would be intervening in the ongoing genocide case against Israel's crimes in Gaza at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
"German government firmly and explicitly rejects the accusation of genocide that has now been made against Israel before the International Court of Justice. This accusation has no basis whatsoever," spokesperson Steffen Hebestreit said in a statement on Friday.
He stressed that Germany bears special responsibility for Israel due to the Nazi genocide of Jews during World War II and said the government will continue to support Israel to defend itself against Hamas.
"In view of Germany's history, crimes against humanity and Shoah (catastrophe in English), the government is particularly committed to the U.N. Genocide Convention," Hebestreit said.
"The German government supports the International Court of Justice in its work, as it has done for many decades. The government intends to intervene as a third party in the main hearing," he added.
South Africa, which brought the case, accused Israeli authorities of perpetrating genocide against Palestinians in Gaza during their military assault. It also requested provisional measures from the court to protect the Palestinian people, including by calling upon Israel to halt military attacks immediately.
Israel has launched relentless air and ground attacks on the Gaza Strip since a cross-border attack by Hamas, which Tel Aviv says killed around 1,200 people.
At least 23,708 Palestinians have since been killed, mostly women and children and 60,050 others injured, according to Palestinian health authorities.
Soon after the current conflict began on Oct. 7, Israel ordered over 1 million people in the northern Gaza Strip to relocate to the south, regardless of warnings from humanitarian groups that such a large displacement would be a humanitarian disaster.
According to the U.N., 85% of the population of Gaza is already internally displaced amid acute shortages of food, clean water and medicines, while 60% of the enclave's infrastructure is damaged or destroyed.
