In our featured essay, professors Victor Kattan and Rémi Fuhrmann explore the “dark side” of international humanitarian law.
Abstract Following the 7 October 2023 attacks, scholars have offered myriad legal views arising from the ongoing hostilities. What is missing from these debates is an exploration of the “dark side” of International Humanitarian Law (IHL), which, as classically conceived, was not developed for urban wars or for conflicts between states and armed groups resisting occupation or colonialism. It was originally developed in the late nineteenth century on a clear distinction between the international (European) and colonial spheres. According to this distinction, conflicts between so-called
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