Three Cyprus activist organisations have issued a statement sharply criticising President Nikos Christodoulides and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis for their endorsement of Israel’s right to self-defence, arguing the position violates international law.
Genocide-Free Cyprus, Cyprus Palestine Solidarity Action and Far Right Watch CY released the statement challenging the leaders’ joint declaration during their recent official visit to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“We affirm Israel’s right to self-defence under international law and reject baseless allegations against Israel,” Christodoulides and Mitsotakis said during the visit, according to the statement.
The organisations argue this amounts to “uncritically adopting the invocation of Article 51 of the UN Charter to justify a genocide“.
The statement outlines three conditions for the right to self-defence under international law, arguing Israel fails to meet them.
On territorial conditions, the groups cite the International Court of Justice’s July 2024 ruling that Israel’s military occupation of Palestinian land is illegal under international law and that Israel’s occupation of Gaza did not end in 2005.
They say Gaza has been under illegal Israeli occupation since 1967, as Israel exercises effective control over the territory—a position they say has been repeatedly confirmed by the United Nations, the ICJ, the International Committee of the Red Cross and international human rights organisations.
On proportionality and necessity, the statement cites the ICJ’s Nicaragua v. United States case, which held that self-defence justifies only measures strictly necessary and proportionate to repelling an armed attack immediately.
The groups quote the UN Secretary-General’s 2024 statement: “Nothing can justify the horrific terrorist attacks by Hamas on 7 October. And nothing can justify the scale of death and destruction in Gaza since then—a level unprecedented in recent history”.
The organisations argue that events following 7 October “constitute extensive, continuous and massive use of force with no functional relevance to the purpose of self-defence, without historical precedent (with the exception of Nazi Germany), which unquestionably (except in the US) meets the definition of genocide”.
The statement also addresses Article 51’s requirement that self-defence measures be reported to the UN Security Council, noting the article recognises only a temporary right that applies “until the UN Security Council has taken the necessary measures to maintain international peace and security”.
The organisations state it is “clear to everyone, with the exception of Nikos Christodoulides and Kyriakos Mitsotakis, that what is happening in Palestine is not an exercise of ‘Israel’s right to self-defence under international law’, but horrific war crimes”.
They add that “in the new dystopian reality emerging worldwide after Trump’s election, few political leaders have dared to take such an open stance in favour of genocide, as Christodoulides and Mitsotakis have done”.
The statement draws a parallel to Cyprus, arguing that if the two leaders’ interpretation of self-defence were accepted, “then the Turkish invasion of Cyprus would also be considered a legitimate exercise of self-defence after the coup d’état of 15 July 1974—that is, the use of disproportionate and unnecessary force on foreign soil, in flagrant violation of international law”.
The groups conclude that “the slippery slide of the two leaders towards Zionism and their attempts to undermine international law invalidate their claim that they are acting in the interests of their countries”.
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