The National
It was long thought of by international legal experts as "a dead letter" – a law that remains on the books, but is generally considered to be outdated. Article 4.A.6 of the Third Geneva Convention, a core text of the international laws of armed conflict, contains a provision for "inhabitants of a non-occupied territory, who on the approach of the enemy spontaneously take up arms to resist the invading forces, without having had time to form themselves into regular armed units". In other words, civilians who pick up weapons and fight back on their own against invaders – also known as a "levee en masse", or a mass mobilisation. READ MORE