Okay, let's unpack this, because usually when
we think of war, we think of the absolute breakdown
of law. Right, total chaos. Exactly. It's force.
It's the end of the rules. But there is this
whole other universe, this fascinating, slightly
obsessive universe, where war is actually a bureaucracy.
Yes. Where an occupying army isn't just a conqueror.
They are something much stranger. They are a...
A caretaker. A caretaker with a tank division,
essentially. Yeah, exactly. Tank division. And
that specific kenshin is what we are diving into
today. We are looking at the career of Eyal Benvenisti.
A huge name in this field. Massive. And look,
if you are studying international law or you
just doom -scroll international news on a daily
basis, you might already know the name. Yeah.
Because he isn't just a guy who wrote a textbook
on the subject. He is the guy who wrote the definitive
textbook on the international law of occupation.
He really is. And what makes this deep dive so
compelling for us today is that we have this
almost perfect narrative arc in the sources we're
looking at. Oh, for sure. We have his biographical
data, right? born in Jerusalem, educated at Yale.
We have his publication lists, which read like
a masterclass bibliography on how to manage military
occupation legally. Right. And then we have the
recent career history. His departure from one
of the most prestigious academic chairs in the
entire world at Cambridge to return to Israel
and actually stand before the International Court
of Justice. It's basically a classic hero's journey,
just with a lot more footnotes and legal briefs.
Yeah, a lot more footnotes. But our mission here
today is to see how a legal scholar moves from
the ivory tower, from writing theories to the
actual mud of a courtroom in the Hague. And more
importantly, I really want to understand his
big concept. Sovereignty is trusteeship. Yes,
sovereignty is trusteeship. Because on paper,
it sounds incredibly noble. But in practice,
it sounds almost impossible to actually enforce.
It is incredibly difficult. But that has been
Viniste's life work. He's been trying to impose
legal order on the absolute chaotic reality of
military control. He is trying to answer that
core question. When the shooting stops but the
army stays, What are the rules? So let's get
into it. Where does a mind like this actually
come from? Because looking at the source material,
he was born right into the thick of it. Israel,
February 18th, 1959. Right. And you really cannot
ignore the family lineage here. He is the son
of Marin Benveniste. Which is a big deal. It
is. For anyone who might not be deep into Israeli
political history, Marin Ben -Denisti was a deputy
mayor of Jerusalem. He was a very prominent political
scientist. Right. And he was famously pragmatic,
sometimes pessimistic about the Israeli -Palestinian
conflict. He dealt directly with the nitty gritty
of municipal administration in a heavily divided
city. So that is crucial context for us. AL grows
up in an environment where conflict isn't just
a news segment you watch on TV. It's literally
a dinner table conversation about zoning laws,
water rights, municipal borders. Exactly. He
is breathing the stuff in way before he ever
steps foot in a law school. It grounds him in
the reality of it. It really does. So he gets
his LLB from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem
in 1984. But then he makes the move that a lot
of very ambitious legal minds make. He heads
to the U .S. He heads to the U .S. He lands at
Yale Law School. And this is where we see the
first major pivot in his trajectory. He earns
his master's in law there in 1988, and then he
finishes his JSD, which is the Doctor of the
Science of Law, in 1990. Now, I want to just
pause for a second on that specific year, 1990.
It's a very pivotal year to be writing about
this. Think about the global vibe in 1990. The
Berlin Wall has just come down. The Soviet Union
is crumbling. You have scholars talking about
the end of history, the ultimate triumph of liberal
democracy. Everyone is celebrating peace. And
what is Ben Veniste writing his doctoral thesis
on? He is writing a thesis titled Conflict of
Laws and Belligerent Occupationist Study in International
and Comparative Law. Belligerent occupation?
Yes! I mean, it feels almost counterintuitive
for the overwhelming optimism of 1990. It's like
showing up to a wedding in a hazmat suit. It
really does feel that way. But looking back at
the sources, it was incredibly prescient. While
the rest of the world was throwing a party for
the end of the Cold War, Benvenis was looking
hard at the legal structures of military control.
He was looking at the cracks. Yes. He was asking
a question that most people honestly thought
was becoming obsolete. When an army takes over
a territory, what law actually applies? Is it
the law of the occupied state? Is it the law
of the occupier? Or is it international law?
And the fascinating thing is... He didn't just
leave that theory sitting on a shelf in the Yale
Library. He takes all that expertise and goes
right back home. He returns to Jerusalem to teach
at Hebrew University. Right. And looking at his
CV from the sources, he wasn't just lecturing.
He was the director of the Minerva Center for
Human Rights from 2000 to 2002. And that role
is so important because it shows he wasn't purely
what you'd call a state lawyer. The Minerva Center
focuses heavily on human rights, so that suggests
he was already looking at how the dry letter
of international law impacts actual flesh and
blood people on the ground. He's making that
connection early. Very early. He was bridging
that massive gap between state security and individual
rights. Which leads us perfectly into what I
think is the real meat and potatoes of this deep
dive. We have to talk about his big idea. The
sources specifically list his notable idea as
sovereignty as trusteeship. This is the crucial
concept. If you take one single thing away from
Benveniste's work today, it should be this idea.
Okay, but let's be real for a second. Sovereignty
as trusteeship sounds like something you'd hear
a professor drone on about in a dusty lecture
hall, and you would immediately zone out. Can
we translate that? What does it actually mean
in plain English for you and me? Okay, let's
break it down. It represents a radical shift
in how we view state power. Traditionally, the
old Westphalian view of sovereignty is all about
ownership. If a state is sovereign over a territory,
it's the king in his castle. My land, my rules,
get off my lawn. Right. absolute unchecked authority
over a space. Exactly. But Ben Viniste challenges
that entirely. He argues for sovereignty as trusteeship.
So think of a trustee handling an inheritance
for a child. The trustee holds the money. They
have the power to spend it. They sign all the
checks. They make the investment decisions. But...
And this is the absolute key. They do not own
it for themselves. Right. They hold it for the
benefit of the child. Precisely. They have a
fiduciary duty. So Benveniste is saying that
a government holding territory, and this is especially
true for occupied territory, isn't the owner.
They are just the caretaker. Oh, wow. I see.
So you are telling an occupying power, you're
telling a general, that they are essentially
just the executor of an estate. That is exactly
what he's arguing. It completely redefines power
as a responsibility instead of a right. If you
are an occupying power acting as a temporary
sovereign, you hold that power and trust for
the benefit of the local people living there.
That is a massive conceptual shift. It is. It
means you can't just exploit the local resources
for your own economic gain. You can't settle
your own citizens there at the expense of the
local population. You are essentially just keeping
the seat warm until the beneficiary, the occupied
people can take over and rule themselves. That
is such a heavy burden to place on a government,
especially right in the middle of a conflict
zone. You're telling an army they have a fiduciary
duty to the people they might have just been
fighting. It is a heavy burden, and that is exactly
why his work is so incredibly influential. It
attempts to add a very stripped moral and legal
constraint to raw military power. And he didn't
just toss this out in a blog post somewhere,
he codified this entire framework in what is
or you believe the definitive text on the subject.
Right. The International Law of Occupation. This
book pops up everywhere in our sources. Originally
published by Princeton University Press in 1993.
Then there was a paperback edition with a new
preface in 2004. And our sources mention a second
edition forthcoming from Oxford University Press.
This book is the Bible for anyone studying this
specific field. It really cemented his status
globally. Absolutely. If you are a military lawyer,
a diplomat, or a commander dealing with a prolonged
occupation anywhere in the world, you have likely
read Benveniste. And he didn't stop there. The
sources show he also wrote legal dualism, the
absorption of the occupied territories into Israel
back in 1989. Plus, another highly specific work
on the legal status of lands acquired by Israelis
before 1948 in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and
East Jerusalem. He has really examined every
single square inch of this legal territory. He
has. And what might stand out to you is the specificity
of those topics. But what stands out to me when
I read through his publication list is the consistency.
From 1989 all the way to the present day, he
has been arguing that the law matters even in
the absolute chaos of an occupation. He insists
that there are rules and those rules are based
on this core idea of trusteeship. You cannot
simply erase the rights of the people living
under your control. But let's play devil's advocate
here for a minute. Is this actually enforceable
in the real world or is it just a really nice
academic theory? Because the sources show he
knows the reality on the ground better than almost
anyone. He knows that temporary occupations can
last for decades. That is the main critique he
often faces, and honestly it's a critique he
actively engages with in his work. He knows very
well that the label of trusteeship can be used
as a mask. Right, like a cover story. Exactly.
If you call yourself a trustee, you can try to
justify staying there forever, just claiming,
oh, the beneficiary isn't ready to rule themselves
yet. That is the old colonial mindset, the white
man's burden. Yeah. We're just here helping you
out until you're ready. And meanwhile, 50 years
pass by. Right. But Benveniste's counter argument
is that without the legal framework of trusteeship,
all you have left is naked conquest. Which is
why it makes right. Exactly. At least with the
trusteeship model, there is a legal standard
you can hold the occupier to. You can drag them
into a court and say, you breached your fiduciary
duty. It gives the international community a
vocabulary to actually challenge that power.
Speaking of things you can drag people to court
over, let's shift gears slightly and talk about
physical stuff. Resources. Because Ben Benesty
didn't just stay in the lane of war and occupation,
the sources highlight another major focus of
his. Yes, his work on shared resources. Right.
He wrote Sharing Transboundary Resources, International
Law, and Optimal Resource Use, published by Cambridge
University Press in 2002. This is where he broadens
his scope significantly. But if we connect this
to the bigger picture of his career, it is the
exact same underlying philosophy. The trusteeship
idea again. Yes. Just as a state is a trustee
for the people living in a territory, states
that share a river or an aquifer are trustees
for that resource. Which sounds incredibly relevant
today. I mean, you look at water wars, climate
change. Usually, a country's attitude is, well,
the river flows through my land. I can build
a dam if I want to. Right. That's known as the
Harmon Doctrine, total absolute territorial sovereignty.
But Benveniste completely rejects that approach.
He argues that international law dictates cooperation
and optimal shared use. So you don't own the
water. You don't own the molecules of water,
no. You manage the flow. You have a legal duty
to your neighbor downstream. It is that theme
of responsibility coming up again. You can't
just take your ball and go home. It's fascinating
how consistent his worldview is. Whether he's
talking about a soldier managing a conquered
town or a government managing a shared river,
he is entirely obsessed with the idea that power
has limits and neighbors have rights. It really
is a philosophy of total interdependence. And
he extends this to legal institutions as well.
We see in the sources that he's written extensively
on global governance, articles like national
courts, domestic democracy, and the evolution
of international law. Break that down for us
a bit, because national courts and domestic democracy
sounds a little dry, but I feel like there's
something really important hiding in there. There
is. It's actually fascinating. He looks at how
domestic judges, so say a Supreme Court judge
in Israel or in the UK or Canada, how they interact
with international rules. OK. He argues that
national courts are increasingly becoming the
actual enforcers of international law. They are
the ones who have to check their own domestic
governments. He wants a dialogue between courts
across borders. So he doesn't want international
law to just be a bunch of diplomats whispering
in a room in Geneva. Exactly. He wants it cited
in local courtrooms to stop government overreach
right at the source. He is empowering the local
judges to be the guardians of these massive international
standards. He is, and he had the perfect platform
to push these ideas out into the world. He was
the founding co -editor and later editor -in
-chief of Theoretical Inquiries in Law. He also
served on the editorial board of the American
Journal of International Law. Which is huge.
Being an editor that level means you are a gatekeeper
of ideas. You are shaping the entire direction
of legal scholarship. So by the time we get to
the mid 2010s, Ben Finiste isn't just a participant
in the conversation, he is practically hosting
the conversation. Which brings us to the next
major chapter in his life. Let's call it the
Cambridge era. In May 2015, he gets the big call.
He is appointed the Weedwell Professor of International
Law at the University of Cambridge. We really
need to pause on this because the We Well Professorship
isn't just a job title. It is an absolute institution
in the legal world. Right. It goes way back.
Established in the 19th century. And look at
who he succeeded. He took over from James Crawford.
Who was James Crawford for the listener who might
not know? James Crawford was an absolute titan
in international law. He literally drafted the
articles on state responsibility. And then when
Ben Veniste eventually left the chair, he was
succeeded by Jan Clavers. These are the biggest
names in the business. So to be selected for
this chair is essentially the academic equivalent.
of being knighted. It really is. And while he
was there, the sources note he also served as
the director of the Lodder Pat Center for International
Law. So he really settled into the British academic
aristocracy, but he didn't just stay in the UK.
The sources list this massive global footprint
of visiting professorships. Oh, he was everywhere.
Harvard, Columbia, Michigan, Penn, Toronto, Hamburg,
the Max Planck Institute in Heidelberg. The man
was in incredibly high demand. And the major
awards followed him too. In 2012, he won an advanced
grant from the European Research Council. That
is not small change. Not at all. Those grants
are specifically for leading researchers to pursue
groundbreaking, high -risk projects. It really
confirms that his work on sovereignty and occupation
was considered vital research for Europe and
for the world. So picture this. It is the early
2020s. Eyal Benveniste is at the absolute top
of his game. We well professor it came. Director
of a prestigious center, books on the shelves
everywhere. He has the golden ticket. He does.
He could have just stayed there, right? Sipping
key, writing the third edition of his book, and
retiring in absolute glory. He certainly could
have. He had reached the absolute tentacle of
the ivory tower. But this is where the story
in Our Sources takes a very sharp turn back to
the real world. The return. Let's talk about
the return. In 2023, we see him getting deeply
involved in domestic issues back in Israel. He
becomes a member of the Israeli Law Professor's
Forum for Democracy. Context is really key here.
2023 was an incredibly tumultuous year in Israel
domestically. There were massive public protests
and huge debates regarding the government coalition's
plans for changes in the legal system. And Ben
Veniste, despite sitting comfortably in Cambridge,
engaged directly with this. The forum was established
specifically to respond to those coalition plans.
It connects right back to his work on national
courts, doesn't it? He spent years writing about
how local courts protect democracy and enforce
international standards. And now he felt that
protection was under threat in his own country.
Exactly. It wasn't just a theoretical exercise
in a journal anymore. He saw the guardrails he
wrote about being actively tested. So in 2024,
he makes a massive move. He resigns from the
way wall chair. Which is huge. You just do not
walk away from the way wall chair. No, you don't.
But he does. He leaves Cambridge and moves back
to live in Israel. He dives right back into the
domestic fray. But then, as we know, the scope
of the region widens even further. The war in
Gaza begins. Right. And suddenly, Ayel Ben Venisti
is back in the global spotlight. But this time,
not as a professor grading papers. The ICJ appearance.
We have to talk about this because it feels like
the climax of the story. It is the culmination
of everything we have discussed today. Think
about it. The young student who wrote his thesis
on belligerent occupation in 1990 finds himself
standing before the International Court of Justice
in The Hague more than 30 years later. The sources
confirm he represented Israel in the case brought
by South Africa, the application of the Convention
on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide.
Yes. And just to give context without taking
any sides, this case arose out of Israel's conduct
concerning the war in Gaza. It is arguably the
most high profile, emotionally charged, and legally
complex case of the entire decade. And regardless
of where you, the listener, stand on the politics
of that conflict, just think about the weight
of that moment for him personally as a scholar.
It is profound. He has spent his entire life
studying the theoretical limits of power. He
defined the modern laws of war. He literally
wrote the textbook on occupation. And now he
is standing in the Great Hall of Justice applying
those exact theories in real time defense of
his country during an active brutal conflict.
It feels like the ultimate test of his sovereignty
as trusteeship idea, doesn't it? Because when
you are in a courtroom, you aren't a neutral
trustee anymore. You aren't just an academic
observing from above. You are a partisan advocate.
You have to win for your client. That is the
ultimate tension here. When you are an academic,
you deal in hypotheticals. If state A does X,
then law Y applies. It's clean. But the ICJ is
not a hypothetical. Far from it. Standing there,
representing a nation accused of the gravest
crime in international law, that is messy reality.
He had to take his highly nuanced theories about
the duties of a commander and the rights of civilians
and apply them to an incredibly complex war.
It really brings the whole journey full circle,
from being the son of Marin Benvidisti in the
municipal politics of Jerusalem to the halls
of Yale, the cloisters of Cambridge, and finally,
arguing in the courtroom in The Hague. It creates
a completely fascinating narrative arc. He started
his career by defining the rules of the game,
and he ended up as a key player on the field
during the championship match, so to speak. Yeah.
And regardless of the outcome, his presence there
signals something important. It shows that the
state was engaging with the international court
on the basis of law. They didn't just ignore
the court. They sent their absolute heavyweight
scholar to argue the technicalities of the convention.
So looking back at this entire deep dive, we
have a scholar who didn't just watch history
happen from the sidelines, he actively tried
to build the guardrails for it. That is a beautiful
way to put it. Guardrails. He built concepts
like trusteeship, the specific duties of the
occupant, the legal management of shared resources.
He spent a career trying to ensure that when
nations clash, which they inevitably will, the
law doesn't just vanish. He insists that we must
have a vocabulary to criticize power, because
without concepts like sovereignty as trusteeship,
we wouldn't even have the legal tools to say
an occupation is unjust. We would just look at
it and say, well, they won the war too bad. But
guardrails are only ever as good as the drivers.
Indeed. And that is the tension he lives in every
day. The tension between the elegant, clean logic
of international law and the incredibly messy,
brutal reality of war. Benveniste knows better
than anyone that the law often fails. He knows
occupiers rarely act like perfect trustees. But
the persistence of the attempt to create order
out of that chaos. That is his true legacy. We've
covered a lot today. His origins in Jerusalem,
his big ideas on sovereignty, his global tour
of the finest universities, and his dramatic
return to the legal front lines. Ale Benvenisi
isn't just a name in a footnote somewhere. He
is a pivotal figure in understanding how the
world actually tries to maintain order. And he
reminds us that international law isn't static.
It's not just a dusty treaty. It evolves through
people like him, through their books, their teaching,
and their real world arguments in court. Exactly.
It's a living, breathing thing. It really is.
Well, we've reached the end of this deep dive.
We've gone from 1959 to 2024, from pure theory
to the harshest practice. It's been quite a journey.
But before we go, I want to leave you, the listener,
with something to think about. We talked a lot
today about Ben Venisti's core philosophy sovereignty
as trusteeship, this idea that a government holds
power and trust for the benefit of the people.
It's a very noble ideal. It is. But here's the
question you have to ask yourself. Right. If
sovereignty is indeed a trustee ship, what happens
when that trust is tested in the absolute crucible
of modern conflict? Right. When the nation feels
its very survival is on the line, can international
law truly enforce that responsibility? Or does
the trustee inevitably revert to being just the
owner when the chips are down? That is the question
that will likely define the next century of international
law. Something for you to mull over. Thanks for
joining us on this deep dive. We'll see you next
time.