Jordan led a continuing attack on Israel's separation barrier at the world court on Tuesday, warning that the structure threatens the future stability of the kingdom.
With a parade of speakers denouncing Israel's actions in the West Bank, it appears the case could have implications for Israel's other occupational policies -- including settlements.
Israel, which says the barrier is meant for self defense, declined to participate in the three-day hearing this week. It said sending the dispute to the court undermines peace negotiations, and also questioned the fairness of the court. The US and European nations have also avoided the hearings.
A total of 15 countries and organizations are participating, all of them sympathetic to the Palestinian case. Many of their arguments have taken aim not only at the barrier, but at Israel's 37-year occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
In an interview published Tuesday in the Israeli daily Yediot Ahronot, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon denounced the Hague process as "a campaign of hypocrisy."
"What is happening at The Hague is an attempt to deny Israel the right to defend itself," Sharon told the daily. "We will not give in. Israel will build the security fence and complete it."
Attention was focused Tuesday on Jordan, which controlled the West Bank before Israel captured it during the 1967 Mideast war. The hearings have raised tensions between the two neighbors, which signed a peace agreement in 1994.
Unlike other countries supporting the Palestinians this week, Jordan views the Israeli barrier as a direct threat, fearing the barrier will make life so hard for Palestinians that they will flee into the neighboring kingdom, straining its resources and upsetting a delicate demographic balance.
"With the exception of the Palestinians themselves, we feel we Jordanians are the ones who could be most affected by Israel's decision to place the wall where it has and where it intends to do so in the near future," Prince Zeid Al Hussein, head of the Jordanian delegation, told the court.
The hearing opened Monday, a day after a Palestinian suicide bomber in Jerusalem killed eight people. Israel has pointed to the attack as proof of the need for the barrier.
Al Hussein called the suicide bombings "horrific." But he also said they must be seen in the context of Israel's four-decade occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, which he called ``dominating ... and degrading'' to the Palestinian population.
Sir Arthur Watts, counsel for the Jordanians, attacked Israel's stance that the barrier is a temporary security measure.
Showing the justices a map of a proposed route of the barrier, he said the structure is meant to connect Israel proper with its settlements in the West Bank.
"The plan stretches for the most part well within the occupied territory," he said. "This wall is not primarily about the defense of Israel's territory."
"If the wall defends anything, it is ... the position of Israeli settlements in the occupied territories," he said, adding that there is "no right to self defense to that which is in itself unlawful."
Israel has built about one-quarter of the structure, a series of walls, fences, razor wire and trenches that could stretch 740km when complete. However, it has not made a decision on the final route of the barrier and has begun making small changes which it says are to ease the effect on Palestinian civilians.
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