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Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/22482/international-law-tyrannical-regimes
International Law Can't Stop Tyrannical Regimes
(Gatestone Institute) Prof. Gerald M. Steinberg - The leaders of Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Norway and most European countries have made statements on the essential importance of obeying international law while waging war against Iran and its terror proxies, such as Hizbullah, claiming preventive force against murderous regimes is somehow illegal. Such statements reveal a shallow and dangerous Western discourse on war, law, and justice. A chorus of morally blind academics claiming legal expertise promote an imaginary "rules-based international order" that paralyzes democracies while protecting despotic dictators and terrorist tyrants. Helen Clark, New Zealand's former prime minister, claimed "international law has been breached" by U.S.-Israeli strikes on the Islamic Republic of Iran, a regime whose mottos are "death to America" and "death to Israel." In this view, reminiscent of European pacifists of the 1920s and 1930s, nothing can be done to restrain the world's malicious dictators and warmongering aggressors before they begin mass slaughter. In particular, those who condemn the strikes against Iran by claiming the mantle of international law erase more than four decades in which the Islamic Republic waged a murderous campaign against the U.S. and Israel. The nuclear dimension of Iran's aggressive ambitions makes stopping the threat of mass destruction from Iran more urgent still. A regime that blatantly calls for the elimination of another state and works to implement that objective cannot plausibly expect its neighbors to view the nuclear project as legitimate civilian energy production. In reality, no legitimate legal system, including international law, can expect victims to ignore visible and credible threats of annihilation. Since the 19th century, states have recognized that a government facing an overwhelming and accelerating threat may - indeed, must - act to defend its citizens before they are attacked. This is the essence of justice. When a terror regime builds missiles, arms proxy militias, and advances toward nuclear capability while proclaiming its desire to destroy its neighbors, inaction is suicidal. The writer is founder and president of NGO Monitor.