Grandmothers Against Genocide Takes on the Storting and the World Is Watching
By Abida Kahlun | Bureau Chief Helsinki | SNN News Finland
BREAKING Norway’s national prosecuting authority has formally recommended a criminal investigation into the country’s most senior politicians including the Prime Minister over alleged complicity in Israel’s genocide in Gaza. This is not a protest. This is a legal proceeding.
The Grandmothers Who Would Not Look Away
It began not in a courtroom, not in a parliament, and not in the offices of a prestigious law firm. It began with grandmothers.
Grandmothers Against Genocide (GRAG) a Norwegian activist organisation whose name carries both simplicity and moral weight has filed a formal criminal complaint against four of Norway’s most powerful political figures, accusing them of personal criminal complicity in Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza.
The complaint, submitted to Kripos Norway’s National Criminal Investigation Service on April 16, 2025, names:
- Jonas Gahr Støre, who leads the Norwegian government as Prime Minister
- Espen Barth Eide Foreign Minister
- Jens Stoltenberg Finance Minister and former NATO Secretary-General
- Trygve Slagsvold Vedum Former Finance Minister
In a significant legal development exclusively reported by Middle East Eye, the Norwegian Prosecuting Authority has now formally recommended that Kripos investigate the complaint overturning an earlier decision to dismiss it.
A letter seen by MEE confirms that prosecutors have asked Kripos to formally notify all named individuals of the pending investigation against them.
This is no longer a civil society gesture. This is a criminal proceeding moving through Norway’s legal system.
What the Complaint Alleges In Precise Legal Terms
The complaint does not deal in generalities. It is grounded in Chapter 16 of the Norwegian Penal Code, which incorporates the provisions of the Rome Statute the founding treaty of the International Criminal Court into Norwegian domestic law.
Under these provisions, personal criminal liability for complicity in genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes is clearly established.
The specific allegations are as follows:
. Investment Complicity Through the Sovereign Wealth Fund Norway’s Government Pension Fund Global (GPFG) the world’s largest single investor, managing approximately $2.2 trillion in assets holds ownership stakes in arms companies that directly supply the Israeli military.
These include multinational defence firms such as Leonardo and ThyssenKrupp, which have continued to export military equipment to Israel throughout its campaign in Gaza.
While the GPFG divested from 35 Israeli companies in 2025 following breaches of its ethical investment policy, it continues to hold stakes in 29 other Israeli companies a decision maintained in part following pressure from the United States, where State Department officials expressed strong concern about Norway’s divestment direction in September 2025.
A proposal for blanket divestment from all companies implicated in Israeli war crimes was brought before the Norwegian parliament the Storting in June 2025. It was rejected, primarily due to opposition from the ruling Labour Party, which voted alongside conservative opposition parties to defeat the bill.
. Arms Export Complicity Norway sells weapons components to the United States including parts used in F-35 fighter jets that have subsequently been used in Israeli military operations in Gaza. The complaint identifies this supply chain as a direct material contribution to the ongoing atrocities.
. Political and Diplomatic Cover The three Labour Party leaders named in the complaint are accused of providing years of unilateral moral and political support for Israel’s security narrative while simultaneously failing to advocate for Palestinian civilian protection thereby,
the complaint argues, providing diplomatic cover for Israel’s conduct and obscuring its crimes from international accountability.
. Deliberate Misinformation Prime Minister Støre is separately accused of providing knowingly false information to the Norwegian public during a televised press conference on May 22, 2024 documented in the complaint’s official attachments to the detriment of the Palestinian population.
The Legal Architecture: Why This Case Has Standing
Terje Einarsen, Professor of Law at the University of Bergen and one of Norway’s foremost experts in international criminal law, provided legal advice to the complaint in a personal capacity. His assessment is significant:
It is highly likely that Norway’s top leaders had full knowledge of how the fund’s investments were connected to ongoing atrocities in Gaza.
Crucially, Einarsen adds that intent is not a prerequisite for criminal liability under these provisions:
Legal experts say proof of intent is not required. If Norwegian politicians knew their investments were funding atrocities and did nothing to stop them, that alone may be sufficient grounds for criminal liability.
This legal framing aiding and abetting without requiring proof of genocidal intent is the same framework that has been applied in international war crimes tribunals. It is a serious and well-established legal theory. It is not, by any measure, a fringe argument.
Francesca Albanese, the UN Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, had already written directly to Stoltenberg in May 2025, warning that the fund’s continued investments in companies implicated in war crimes placed Norway at risk of breaching its obligations under international law. That warning went unheeded. It now forms part of the evidentiary record.
The Evidence: 118 Pages That Cannot Be Ignored
In June 2025, the academic group Historians for Palestine published a comprehensive 118-page report documenting the GPFG’s investments in companies directly implicated in Israeli war crimes.
The report was subsequently submitted as formal evidence alongside the criminal complaint.
Pål Nygaard, Professor of Economic History at BI Norwegian Business School and co-author of the report, was unambiguous in his conclusions:
“The continued investments in companies that actively contribute to Israel’s violation of international law equals accepting these mass atrocities.”
He added:
“It is the politicians who have designed this system for responsible investments, and they are then also ultimately responsible to make sure the fund and the Council on Ethics manages the fund’s investments accordingly.”
A separate complaint filed by The Palestine Committee of Norway additionally names Nicolai Tangen, chief executive of the GPFG, and Ida Wolden Bache, Governor of the Norwegian Central Bank (Norges Bank), as respondents extending the legal challenge beyond elected politicians and into the financial governance structure of the fund itself.
The Human Cost Behind the Legal Language
Since October 2023, Israeli military operations in Gaza have killed over 72,000 Palestinians a figure that continues to rise. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, UNRWA, and the World Food Programme have all documented conditions of deliberate starvation, infrastructure destruction, and civilian targeting that meet the legal threshold for crimes against humanity under the Rome Statute.
It is against this backdrop 72,000 dead, a population on the edge of famine, a healthcare system in ruins that the grandmothers of Norway decided that watching was no longer acceptable.
Kirsti Maehle, co-founder of GRAG, articulated the moral core of the complaint with clarity that no legal brief could match:
“They sit in our parliament, the Storting, and vote in favour of the investments. That amounts to voting over contributing to crimes against humanity, which is absolutely outrageous.”
She added that prosecution of those responsible would provide what she called a much-needed guiding principle proof that elected representatives who turn a blind eye to mass atrocity are not beyond the reach of the law.
A Global Movement Taking Root
The significance of this complaint extends far beyond Norway’s borders. GRAG’s founding members have explicitly stated their hope that this action will inspire similar complaints in other Western countries whose governments and sovereign funds maintain financial relationships with the Israeli military apparatus.
That hope is already becoming reality. In Toronto, Canada, grandmother Anne Marie Angus inspired by the same moral impulse stood on the corner of Bay and Bloor with her walker and a sign reading “Grandmothers Against Genocide.” She had never attended a protest in her life.
“When I read that the Palestinian mothers are so hungry that their babies are being born blind,” she said, “I knew that as a grandmother, I needed to help.”
The precedent for this kind of moral courage is historical. In Argentina, during the darkest years of the military junta, it was the Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo who broke the silence of a terrified population. They demanded accountability when governments would not. They shook an authoritarian regime. They won.
The grandmothers of Norway are operating in the same tradition. And the law, this time, may be on their side.
What Happens Next
The Norwegian Prosecuting Authority’s recommendation to Kripos represents a pivotal threshold. The case now moves into formal criminal investigation. The politicians named among them a sitting Prime Minister and a former NATO Secretary-General have been formally notified of proceedings against them.
The Norwegian Prime Minister’s Office, the GPFG, Kripos, and the Norwegian Prosecuting Authority have all been approached for comment. As of publication, no substantive response has been received.
The world’s largest sovereign wealth fund is under criminal scrutiny. Norway’s most powerful politicians are under investigation. And the women who set this in motion did so not from positions of power, but from a place of conscience.
That is the story. And it is far from over.
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