The Chr. Michelsen lecture 2026: Palestine and the paradox of international humanitarian law

What can the case of Palestine tell us about the capacities and limits of international humanitarian law? This was one of the key questions addressed by Professor Ilana Feldman in this year’s Chr. Michelsen lecture.

The Israeli war on Gaza that followed Hamas’ attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, has sparked intense debate about the role and capabilities of international humanitarian law in protecting civilians. In her keynote at the Chr. Michelsen lecture 2026, Ilana Feldman, Professor at George Washington University, explored the paradox of international humanitarian law through the lens of Palestine, a context where the law’s promise to protect civilians seems impossible to fulfill. She argued that how one chooses to frame the unique challenge Palestine represents is crucial for how one addresses and deals with it and used three distinct case studies to illustrate how the framing shapes how various actors have worked on promoting and protecting the rights of civilians.

• The International Committee of the Red Cross’s efforts to assert its authority and the force of IHL during the early years of the Israeli occupation (1967–75);
• The World Council of Churches’ evolving stance on Palestine in the 1960s, shifting from aid to advocacy and reinterpreting complicity;
• BADIL’s work to educate international advocates, challenging dominant frameworks of standing and responsibility

The keynote lecture was followed by a panel conversation on the targeting of civilian populations and infrastructure in conflict, and the possibilities and limitations of peacebuilding interventions. CMI researchers Lovise Aalen, Munzoul Assal, and Aslak Jangaard Orre contributed with reflections from Ethiopia, Mozambique, and Sudan, extending the discussion beyond the Palestinian context. Antonio De Lauri (research director at CMI) moderated the event.

The Chr. Michelsen prize for outstanding development research was also awarded during the event. The prize was awarded to Antoine de Bengy Puyvallée for his article “The rising authority and agency of public–private partnerships in global health governance,” published in Policy & Society in 2024. In this article, he critically examines the rise of public–private partnerships (PPPs) and argues that we are witnessing the emergence of a “sub-class” of highly institutionalized partnerships that are developing into transnational bureaucracies.