Martin K How have African States repositioned their foreign policy in response to the Gaza conflict, and what do UN votes and ICJ proceedings in 2024–2025 reveal about the balance between solidarity and realpolitik?
The Gaza conflict has acted as a diplomatic accelerant for African States, forcing a recalibration of long-standing alignments between principled solidarity, pragmatic security concerns, and realpolitik imperatives. Drawing on Constructivist insights into identity and historical memory, Realist assumptions about interest-maximization, and Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL), this analysis situates African responses within the broader politics of norm enforcement.
Three inflection points in 2024–2025, UN Security Council Resolution 2728, decisive UN General Assembly ceasefire votes, and the ICJ’s July 2024 advisory opinion on Israel’s occupation illuminate a tripartite African posture: the Legal–Justice Camp, the Pragmatic Stabilizers, and the Balancers. This plurality reflects neither reflexive ideology nor purely transactional alignment; instead, it signals an emerging strategic legalism, where international law is used as both a shield and lever in a fragmented global order. Historical parallels with African responses to the Rwanda (1994), the Kosovo conflict (1999), the Iraq War (2003), the Libyan uprising (2011), and the Namibia ICJ opinion (1971) reveal both continuity and evolution in African diplomatic behavior.
The conclusion argues that the Gaza conflict has consolidated a minimum legal denominator across Africa, even as policy paths diverge, marking a shift from moral witness to a deliberate, law-informed statecraft.
Introducing Gaza as a Diplomatic Stress Test for African States
Wars do not only redraw battle lines; they also reconfigure the cartography of alliances. As an African scholar trained in international relations, I have watched the Gaza conflict unfold less as a remote humanitarian crisis and more as a diagnostic moment, a stress test for the continent’s diplomatic DNA. The question before African capitals was not simply whether to stand with Palestine; it was whether to anchor positions in the Constructivist inheritance of anti-colonial solidarity, or to pivot toward Realist calculations of security, trade, and migration diplomacy.
In three key arenas, the test became visible. First, the UN Security Council’s Resolution 2728 (March 25, 2024) demanded an immediate ceasefire for Ramadan, passing 14–0 with the United States abstaining. This was a rare moment where African diplomatic agency, via Algeria’s sponsorship, shaped the outcome in the world’s most securitized chamber. Second, in December 2024, the UN General Assembly voted by massive margins, 158–9 and 159–9, to demand a permanent ceasefire and protect UNRWA, reaffirming Africa’s deep-rooted rhetorical and voting alignment with the Palestinian cause. Third, on July 19, 2024, the ICJ declared Israel’s continued occupation unlawful, ordered the cessation of settlements, and called for reparations, an opinion that, to my reading, carried the moral weight of the 1971 Namibia advisory opinion, when the Court deemed South Africa’s presence in Namibia illegal.
When the African Union presented oral arguments at the ICJ earlier in 2024, it was more than a legal intervention; it was a performance of African agency within a system where global legal discourse has often been monopolized by the Global North. This was, in English School terms, an act of pluralist international society politics: using shared norms to safeguard sovereignty and self-determination.
Three Clues from 2024–2025
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- Security Council Ceasefire: Algeria’s Voice in the Chamber
When UN Security Council Resolution 2728 was adopted on 25 March 2024, calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza during Ramadan and the unconditional release of hostages, the tally stood at 14 in favor and one abstention, the United States. What made this outcome historically notable was not just the near-universal support, but also Algeria’s leadership role in drafting and sponsoring the resolution alongside other elected members; this marked a rare moment of Africa-sourced initiative in the Council’s most securitized chamber.
Algeria’s ambassador, Amar Bendjama, framed the resolution emotionally yet pointedly: “Finally, the Security Council is shouldering its responsibility… The bloodbath has continued for far too long”. From a Realist perspective, this move reflects savvy agenda-setting. Algeria seized the diplomatic opening created by prior vetoes and U.S. hesitance to channel an Africa-rooted push for a ceasefire, all while minimizing risk to its strategic relationships.
Yet from a Constructivist standpoint, the action is deeply symbolic, rooted in Algeria’s liberation memory and long-standing identity as a Palestinian solidarity stronghold. It echoes its historic support since independence in 1962, including early recognition of Palestine and repeated diplomatic and moral alignment with the Palestinian cause.
The episode also evokes a striking historical parallel: in 2011, South Africa’s vote in favor of Security Council Resolution 1973 authorizing intervention in Libya was framed in humanitarian terms but later criticized as enabling overreach, signaling how African normative diplomacy can carry unintended consequences. Algeria’s approach in 2024, by contrast, was carefully calibrated; rather than opening the door to external military intervention, it anchored demands in temporal humanitarian relief (Ramadan ceasefire) and legal framing, eg, hostage release, while avoiding escalation and maintaining Council cohesion.
As I reflected on this in the moment, I recall feeling this was a turning point in how African elected members can claim agenda-setting authority in the world’s most polarized body, even if only briefly. It signaled that African diplomacy is not confined to symbolic UNGA statements but can insert a normative voice at the highest levels of global security governance.
In sum, Algeria’s role in Resolution 2728 exemplifies a hybrid of Realist strategy, seizing opportunities and balancing risk, and Constructivist identity politics, drawing on liberationist memory. It illustrates how African diplomacy today weaves together historical symbolism and practical advantage, pushing back against narratives that Africa is a mere bloc-voter rather than an issue-shaper.
- General Assembly Votes: Overwhelming Support, Layered Motives
In December 2024, the UN General Assembly (UNGA) adopted two high-profile resolutions: one demanding an “immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire” in Gaza, and another supporting UNRWA’s continued operations, reportedly with 158 and 159 votes in favor, respectively, out of 193 member States. These overwhelming majorities were more than symbolic; they spoke to a global normative impulse, and that impulse was notably strong across African delegations.
Yet, as I witnessed the flurry of “ayes” being recorded, I sensed a deeper complexity: these expressions of solidarity were not homogenous or ritualistic. From a TWAIL (Third World Approaches to International Law) perspective, many African governments used their votes to signal resistance to colonial continuity, particularly in terms of occupation and settlements, which mirror the settler-colonial violence they have historically opposed. The resolutions resonated with the language of anti-colonial justice, offering coherence to a legal-political tradition rooted in decolonial memory.
Conversely, for other capitals, voting “yes” was a low-cost ritual of legitimacy, a gesture that mollified domestic publics, reaffirmed regional leadership aspirations, and avoided rhetorical isolation. Critically, this approach protected more sensitive external relationships, including those with Western security partners and Gulf donors. As U.S. Deputy Ambassador Robert Wood lamented, “Both of these resolutions have significant problems,” arguing they “reward Hamas” and ignore the hostages’ plight. The U.S.’s critique only amplified the diplomatic utility of voting affirmatively for African governments, not just for moral optics, but also to use normative cover in navigating competing pressures.
This layered calculus is not new in African diplomatic history. During the Iraq War debates in 2003, numerous states condemned the invasion in the Assembly while maintaining, and in some cases deepening, ties to Washington in bilateral and security domains. That dual track—public ideological opposition paired with pragmatic hedging- reflects a longstanding Realist-constructivist hybrid logic in African diplomacy: governments symbolically align with principle, even while pursuing realpolitik imperatives.
Taken together, these UNGA votes underscore an Africa that is not reduced to UN roll-call patterns but is strategically layering principle and interest. This dual behavior aligns with the English School’s insight that States often navigate between pluralist norms (like sovereignty and non-intervention) and solidarist ethical imperatives without choosing one over the other.
- ICJ Advisory Opinion: The Legal Turn
On 19 July 2024, the International Court of Justice delivered a seminal advisory opinion declaring that Israel has continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT), including the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza, was unlawful, and urging that it be ended “as rapidly as possible.” It further mandated that Israel cease new settlement activity, evacuate settlers, and make reparations. Crucially, the Court affirmed that all states and international organizations are under an obligation not to recognize the situation arising from this unlawful occupation, or to assist in maintaining it.
As I read the judgment, I felt echoes of the 1971 Namibia advisory opinion, which similarly imposed a legal duty of non-recognition on States regarding South Africa’s illegal presence in Namibia. In both instances, the law transcended descriptive abstraction; it became prescriptive architecture, erecting firm-duty structures designed to constrain complicity and compel third-party action. This shift signals the rise of what I call strategic legalism: law deployed not as a rhetorical flourish, but as a calibrated instrument of foreign policy.
African States, collectively and individually, were more than passive recipients of this jurisprudence. The African Union’s oral argumentation at the Court’s February hearings, voicing a clear rejection of Israel’s colonial-style occupation and championing reparatory justice, amplified Africa as both beneficiary and custodian of an international legal order. This normative stewardship reflects a Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL) dynamic: using international law as both a shield against oppression and a tool for rebuilding equity.
Nevertheless, the legal turn did not remain confined to doctrine; it has started to reshape policy in tangible ways. In Bogotá, July 2025, a 30-nation conference co-led by South Africa and Colombia, dubbed the “Hague Group,” brought States together to operationalize the ICJ’s rulings. Their agenda included mapping out collective enforcement mechanisms such as arms embargoes, economic restrictions, and diplomatic bans, all designed to translate legal obligations into political impact. At the same time, legal and civil society actors have drawn attention to the EU’s East Mediterranean gas deal, which crosses Palestinian waters without consent, arguing that it risks breaching the ICJ’s non-recognition mandate and potentially rendering the EU complicit in sustaining occupation dynamics. Further momentum came in September 2024, when NGOs summoned states to uphold the Court’s prescriptions by suspending arms transfers and trade that facilitate unlawful presence, a call that underscored the emergence of a moral-legal bridge spanning the courtroom and the policymaking arena.
In sum, this advisory opinion marks a key shift in how African diplomacy deploys international law: far from simply invoking courts rhetorically, African States are embedding legal obligation into political architecture. Law has become a diplomatic resource, something to be wielded, maintained, and expanded, not just prayed for.
Africa’s Three Broad Postures through Theoretical Lenses
- The Legal–Justice Camp: Normative Vanguardism and Decolonial Jurisprudence
Led symbolically by South Africa, joined by Namibia, and bolstered by African Union organs, this posture represents the Constructivist and Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL) tradition in its clearest form. It frames international law not as a neutral arbiter but as a historically contested arena, one where the Global South can reclaim agency.
South Africa’s case before the ICJ in December 2023, alleging Israel’s breach of the Genocide Convention, was not an isolated move but part of a sustained legal–diplomatic offensive. Pretoria drew upon the Convention’s universalist promise, that protection from genocide is owed to all peoples, to place Palestine’s plight within the same moral category as the Holocaust and the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. This framing resonated strongly within Africa, where historical experiences of racial domination and mass atrocities remain politically vivid.
The AU’s legal interventions in the ICJ’s advisory proceedings in February 2024 further reinforced the continent’s stake in shaping global jurisprudence. As I watched those oral pleadings, I was reminded of Africa’s anti-apartheid legal struggle: the mobilization of the ICJ in the 1971 Namibia opinion, the General Assembly’s “Uniting for Peace” resolution, and the push for sanctions were all part of a moral–legal offensive that positioned Africa as a norm entrepreneur in the Cold War order.
The difference today is that this posture is no longer purely defensive. African legalists are deploying the same legal armature beyond the continent, asserting that Africa’s normative capital, its history of fighting settler colonialism, can be leveraged to shape global conflicts. This is strategic normative Vanguardism: law as both shield and spear.
- Pragmatic Stabilizers and Mediators: Quiet Realism in Normative Environments
Pragmatic stabilizers inhabit the Realist–English School hybrid space: they affirm the value of norms but are acutely aware of the geopolitical costs of maximalist legal positioning. Examples include African States that have taken on mediation or facilitation roles in other global crises, such as Senegal’s diplomatic shuttle between Moscow and Kyiv in 2022, or Kenya’s mediation in the Ethiopia–Tigray conflict.
Their posture recalls Africa’s mediation in the Ethiopia–Eritrea war (1998–2000) and Sudan peace processes (2005), where sustaining dialogue channels were valued over making absolutist demands. By co-sponsoring UNSC Resolution 2728 in March 2024, these states demonstrated that targeted, incremental gains, humanitarian corridors, hostage release clauses, and temporary ceasefires could be achieved without fracturing Council consensus.
From my observation, their caution stems from an understanding that mediation credibility is a finite currency: if one side perceives the mediator as legally maximalist or overtly partisan, the entire negotiation framework risks collapse. Thus, for pragmatic stabilizers, law operates as a floor, not a ceiling; it sets the boundaries of acceptable diplomacy but does not dictate every tactical choice.
- Balancers in a Fragmented Order: Hedging in the Multipolar Age
Balancers display a Realist instinct to hedge in an environment where U.S., EU, Gulf, Chinese, and Russian influence all exert competing gravitational pulls. They support humanitarian principles at the UNGA but stop short of endorsing binding legal remedies—such as sanctions or universal jurisdiction, which might jeopardize defence agreements, infrastructure investments, or migration compacts.
This strategic ambiguity mirrors their conduct in past crises. In the Kosovo independence debates of 1999 and the subsequent ICJ advisory opinion in 2010, many African States withheld formal recognition, not because of indifference, but to avoid alienating either Western or Russian partners. Similarly, in the 2003 Iraq War, African condemnation at the UNGA did not translate into ruptured security or aid ties with Washington.
The English School concept of pluralist sovereignty explains this tension: balancers value the stability of the state system over solidarist enforcement of contested norms. In practice, this means Africa’s balancers can live with a minimum legal consensus; occupation is unlawful, while sidestepping maximal enforcement measures that carry economic or security risks.
From Solidarity vs. Realism to Strategic Legalism
The 2024–2025 record disrupts the simplistic binary between moral solidarity and geopolitical realism. The ICJ advisory opinion and UNGA supermajority votes have created a minimum normative denominator across Africa’s foreign policy spectrum. Even the most risk-averse balancers can cite the occupation’s illegality in diplomatic forums; legal–justice advocates and pragmatic stabilizers can push further, leveraging this baseline to press for tangible policy shifts.
In English School terms, Africa is shifting from norm taker to norm shaper, not only participating in international society but also subtly influencing how its principles are interpreted and operationalized. This is strategic legalism: law as an operational instrument of statecraft, embedded within diverse national strategies rather than appended as a moral afterthought.
The real test will be whether this synthesis holds when Africa’s internal conflicts, Sudan, the eastern DRC, and the Sahel, are subjected to the same legal yardsticks.
Conclusion: Law as Africa’s Double-Edged Tool
The Gaza conflict has revealed a plural Africa. Legalists, stabilizers, and balancers, yet united by an underlying legal consensus. For observers who reduce African diplomacy to UN voting charts, this may seem paradoxical. For practitioners, it marks a shift toward strategic legalism: using law as both shield and lever in an era of coercive multipolarity.
As I read the July 2024 ICJ opinion, I felt the resonance of Namibia 1971, apartheid-era sanctions, and Africa’s long campaign to end settler colonialism. These were moments when the juridical imagination altered political possibility. Whether Africa can now apply this same imagination inward, to its theatres of conflict, will determine if this is remembered as an inflection point in continental statecraft, or as a fleeting convergence of law and principle in a turbulent global order.
Notes
To make this analytical opinion, I have used and read the following publications, legal documents, and reports: official UN Security Council and General Assembly resolutions, the International Court of Justice advisory opinions of 1971 and 2024, African Union oral statements, and a range of academic works on Constructivism, Realism, the English School, and Third World Approaches to International Law.
I also drew from reputable news coverage by Associated Press, Reuters, Al Jazeera, Le Monde, and The Guardian, as well as scholarly analyses of historical precedents, including Kosovo 1999, Iraq 2003, Libya 2011, and Africa’s anti-apartheid legal strategies. Together, these sources informed the theoretical framing, historical comparisons, and empirical grounding of the arguments presented.
