An Extraordinary Day for International Justice: ICC Issues Arrest Warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant for War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity
21.11.24
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In what will forever be remembered as an extraordinary day for international justice, the International Criminal Court (ICC) today issued arrest warrants, for war crimes and crimes against humanity, for Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minster, and Yoav Gallant, who, until recently, was the defense minister in Netanyahu’s coalition government.
In its press release, the Court stated that it had “issued warrants of arrest for two individuals, Mr. Benjamin Netanyahu and Mr. Yoav Gallant, for crimes against humanity and war crimes committed from at least 8 October 2023 until at least 20 May 2024, the day the Prosecution filed the applications for warrants of arrest.”
The announcement in May, by Karim Khan KC, the chief prosecutor of the ICC, that arrest warrants would be sought for Netanyahu and Gallant, as well as for three Hamas leaders (two of whom have subsequently been murdered by Israel), was greeted at the time with huge enthusiasm, and a great sense of relief, by those who had been calling, since 2015, for the ICC to hold Israel accountable for its long history of grave crimes against the Palestinians.
Subsequently, however, there were fears that the arrest warrants would be derailed, as pressure appeared to be being applied to the judges responsible for implementing Khan’s request, and Khan himself was subjected to a dubious claim of misconduct.
Thankfully, all this devious behind-the-scenes activity has failed to derail the immensely important issuing of the arrest warrants, which, finally, have dealt a major blow to all of Israel’s outrageous efforts — fully backed by most western governments — to pretend that it could engage, with complete impunity, in the most horrendous violations of almost every aspect of international humanitarian law that any of us have witnessed in our lifetimes.
The charges explained
In further explanation of the charges on which the arrest warrants are based, the Court announced that, “with regard to the crimes”, it “found reasonable grounds to believe” that Netanyahu and Gallant “each bear criminal responsibility for the following crimes as co-perpetrators for committing the acts jointly with others: the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare; and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts.”
The Court also “found reasonable grounds to believe” that Netanyahu and Gallant “each bear criminal responsibility as civilian superiors for the war crime of intentionally directing an attack against the civilian population.”
Providing further details, the Court explained that it “found reasonable grounds to believe” that, since last October, “international humanitarian law related to international armed conflict between Israel and Palestine applied”, because “they are two High Contracting Parties to the 1949 Geneva Conventions and because Israel occupies at least parts of Palestine”, and “also found that the law related to non-international armed conflict applied to the fighting between Israel and Hamas.”, specifically in relation to “the activities of Israeli government bodies and the armed forces against the civilian population in Palestine, more specifically civilians in Gaza.”
Because the case “therefore concerned the relationship between two parties to an international armed conflict, as well as the relationship between an occupying power and the population in occupied territory”, the Court “found it appropriate”, “with regards to war crimes”, to “issue the arrest warrants pursuant to the law of international armed conflict”, and also “found that the alleged crimes against humanity were part of a widespread and systematic attack against the civilian population of Gaza.”
The Court added that “there are reasonable grounds to believe” that both Netanyahu and Gallant “intentionally and knowingly deprived the civilian population in Gaza of objects indispensable to their survival, including food, water, and medicine and medical supplies, as well as fuel and electricity, from at least 8 October 2023 to 20 May 2024”, further explaining that this finding “is based on the role of Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Gallant in impeding humanitarian aid in violation of international humanitarian law and their failure to facilitate relief by all means at its disposal.”
The Court added that “their conduct led to the disruption of the ability of humanitarian organisations to provide food and other essential goods to the population in need in Gaza”, and that “[t]he aforementioned restrictions, together with cutting off electricity and reducing fuel supply, also had a severe impact on the availability of water in Gaza and the ability of hospitals to provide medical care.”
The Court also noted that “decisions allowing or increasing humanitarian assistance into Gaza were often conditional”, and “were not made to fulfil Israel’s obligations under international humanitarian law or to ensure that the civilian population in Gaza would be adequately supplied with goods in need.” In contrast, “they were a response to the pressure of the international community or requests by the United States of America”, and were, in any case, inadequate, because “the increases in humanitarian assistance were not sufficient to improve the population’s access to essential goods.”
The Court also “found reasonable grounds to believe that no clear military need or other justification under international humanitarian law could be identified for the restrictions placed on access for humanitarian relief operations”, adding that, “Despite warnings and appeals made by, inter alia, the UN Security Council, UN Secretary General, States, and governmental and civil society organisations about the humanitarian situation in Gaza, only minimal humanitarian assistance was authorised.”
As a result, having “considered the prolonged period of deprivation and Mr. Netanyahu’s statement connecting the halt in the essential goods and humanitarian aid with the goals of war”, the Court “therefore found reasonable grounds to believe that Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Gallant bear criminal responsibility for the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare.”
The Court also “found that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the lack of food, water, electricity and fuel, and specific medical supplies, created conditions of life calculated to bring about the destruction of part of the civilian population in Gaza, which resulted in the death of civilians, including children due to malnutrition and dehydration.”
Scholars of genocide will recognise that the paragraph above specifically echoes one of the key elements conforming genocide in the 1948 Genocide Convention; namely, “deliberately inflicting” — on “a national, ethnical, racial or religious group” — “conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.”
The Court added, that, “On the basis of material presented by the Prosecution covering the period until 20 May 2024”, it “could not determine that all elements of the crime against humanity of extermination were met”, although it “did find that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the crime against humanity of murder was committed in relation to these victims.”
In addition, the Court found that, “by intentionally limiting or preventing medical supplies and medicine from getting into Gaza, in particular anaesthetics and anaesthesia machines”, Netanyahu and Gallant “are also responsible for inflicting great suffering by means of inhumane acts on persons in need of treatment.” By way of explanation, they added, “Doctors were forced to operate on wounded persons and carry out amputations, including on children, without anaesthetics, and/or were forced to use inadequate and unsafe means to sedate patients, causing these persons extreme pain and suffering.”
“This”, the Court confirmed, “amounts to the crime against humanity of other inhumane acts.”
The Court “also found reasonable grounds to believe that the abovementioned conduct deprived a significant portion of the civilian population in Gaza of their fundamental rights, including the rights to life and health, and that the population was targeted based on political and/or national grounds”, and it “therefore found that the crime against humanity of persecution was committed.”
Finally, the Court “assessed that there are reasonable grounds to believe that Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Gallant bear criminal responsibility as civilian superiors for the war crime of intentionally directing attacks against the civilian population of Gaza.” While conceding that it “found that the material provided by the Prosecution only allowed it to make findings on two incidents that qualified as attacks that were intentionally directed against civilians”, the Court added that it had “reasonable grounds to believe that Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Gallant, despite having measures available to them to prevent or repress the commission of crimes or ensure the submittal of the matter to the competent authorities, failed to do so.”
What now?
While Israel has responded, in a typically apoplectic manner, to the issuing of the arrest warrants, with Netanyahu, predictably, calling it “antisemitic”, the reality is that the issuing of the arrest warrants is a huge blow to Isreal’s claimed impunity that no amount of bluster can dismiss. As Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst, Marwan Bishara, explained, “pursuing major Western allies like Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant [is] a first” and “a historic breakthrough” for the ICC, which, as he described it, “was initially conceived by Western leaders as a court to try global leaders, often from non-Western nations”, adding, “That’s why it was easy for them to pursue Putin.”
Now, however, the noose has reached Israel, and, as he explained, Netanyahu and Gallant “will be pursued by Interpol”, and “it’s going to be difficult for Netanyahu to be travelling around.”
“This means he is no longer legitimate,” Bishara added, also noting that the International Court of Justice, which recognized, back in January, that a “plausible genocide” was taking place in the Gaza Strip, “will be looking at the genocide case differently now that the Israelis are accused of crimes against humanity.”
Bishara also expressed the hope — one that, it should be noted, will be embraced by a majority of people around the world — that “at last, the people of Gaza, after a year of unfolding genocide, might be able to see their perpetrators face justice.”
I’m no seer, but I can recognize that, outside of the bullish, genocidally enthusiastic corridors of power in the US, other western leaders will be quaking with fear today, as they recognize that all their efforts to pretend that Israel, uniquely in history, has been entitled to commit war crimes and crimes against humanity with complete impunity, have, all along, been legally indefensible.
For the last 14 months, the world has been horribly divided. On the one hand, Israel, its western allies and its shamefully supine mainstream media have done all they can to erase any notion that there are any restraints at all on Israel’s actions, while, on the other, the rest of the world, via the UN Security Council and the UN General Assembly, UN Rapporteurs, NGOs and the majority of the world’s population have been aghast that, in defense of monsters — genuinely evil, depraved monsters — the US and some of its closest allies have supported actions that can, quite genuinely, be compared to the actions of the Nazis in the Second World War, and the actions of our own countries during our blood-soaked centuries of colonial conquest around the world.
UN report after UN report, by eminently qualified experts in international humanitarian law, has established the horrors of what is taking place in Gaza, and yet they have generally been ignored, and the experts have been powerless in the face of the lack of enforcement mechanisms within the UN. Just yesterday, in the Security Council, the US, defying the 14 other members states, vetoed a resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire, the freeing of the hostages seized on October 7, and the unhindered distribution of humanitarian aid.
Today, however, yesterday’s veto makes the US look like criminal accomplices to a nation state that has finally been exposed as an almost indescribably violent, vengeful and vindictive serial abuser of international law — simultaneously, giddily self-righteous and deviously self-pitying — whose leaders are now revealed as the war criminals they have always been, aided and abetted, to a startling and unprecedented degree, by most of the west’s leaders, who now deserve the spotlight to be shone on them for their unforgivable complicity in this most monstrous of crimes.
* * * * *
Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer (of an ongoing photo-journalism project, ‘The State of London’), film-maker and singer-songwriter (the lead singer and main songwriter for the London-based band The Four Fathers, whose music is available via Bandcamp). He is the co-founder of the Close Guantánamo campaign (see the ongoing photo campaign here) and the successful We Stand With Shaker campaign of 2014-15, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here, or you can watch it online here, via the production company Spectacle, for £2.50).
In 2017, Andy became very involved in housing issues. He is the narrator of the documentary film, ‘Concrete Soldiers UK’, about the destruction of council estates, and the inspiring resistance of residents, he wrote a song ‘Grenfell’, in the aftermath of the entirely preventable fire in June 2017 that killed over 70 people, and, in 2018, he was part of the occupation of the Old Tidemill Wildlife Garden in Deptford, to try to prevent its destruction — and that of 16 structurally sound council flats next door — by Lewisham Council and Peabody.
Since 2019, Andy has become increasingly involved in environmental activism, recognizing that climate change poses an unprecedented threat to life on earth, and that the window for change — requiring a severe reduction in the emission of all greenhouse gases, and the dismantling of our suicidal global capitalist system — is rapidly shrinking, as tipping points are reached that are occurring much quicker than even pessimistic climate scientists expected. You can read his articles about the climate crisis here.
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23 Responses
Andy Worthington says...
When I posted this on Facebook, I wrote:
My report about the extraordinarily welcome news that the International Criminal Court (ICC) has today issued arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, for war crimes and crimes against humanity, finally completing a process that was launched six months ago, when the ICC’s chief prosecutor, Karim Khan KC, announced the Court’s intention to issue the arrest warrants.
For the last 14 months, blow after blow has rained down on international accountability, and the very foundations of, and viability of international humanitarian law, as shown by Israel’s impunity in launching a process of extermination in northern Gaza nearly two months ago, after a year of non-stop genocidal assaults on the whole of the Gaza Strip, in the ever-growing archive of compelling, but largely ignored reports by UN experts, and, just yesterday, by the US’s veto of a UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire.
Today’s announcement, however, finally restores the credibility of mechanisms designed to ensure that no political leaders can get away with claiming that the rules don’t apply to them, and that they can endlessly indulge in war crimes and crimes against humanity against a trapped, besieged and starved civilian population that they have been persistently trying to exterminate.
As Israel and US, predictably, rail against the issuing of the arrest warrants, the rest of the west’s leaders, who have fully supported Israel, and the mainstream media who have done the same, ought to be quaking with fear today, as they recognize, I hope, that, as I describe it, “all their efforts to pretend that Israel, uniquely in history, has been entitled to commit war crimes and crimes against humanity with complete impunity, have, all along, been legally indefensible.”
...on November 21st, 2024 at 4:52 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Todd Pierce wrote:
Don’t worry, Trump’s National Security Advisor is on top of it: https://www.jns.org/trumps-nominee-for-security-advisor-vows-strong-response-to-icc/
“The incoming Trump administration’s nominee for national security advisor dismissed international arrest warrants issued on Thursday against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and promised a ‘strong response’ in January.”
Trump is now and always has been, basically a “front” for the Netayahu fascist coalition to operate here in the U.S., and reciprocating that by allowing US Conservatives/Libertarians to subvert the Israeli Supreme Court, as bad as that already is, to make it even worse: more “Conservative.” Or as they recognize in Israel: even more fascist than it is, to deny any recognition of Palestinian human rights.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 5:26 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Good to hear from you, Todd, although I can’t even bear to spend any time on the ordure emerging from the mouths of Trump’s nominees. It amazes me that anyone concerned with the plight of the Palestinians could have thought that Trump would be any better than Biden, and I also presume that the ICC finally issued its arrest warrants today because they too were aware that the hostility towards it will markedly increase come January 20.
For today, however, I’m going to savor this moment, just as I did when George W. Bush canceled his visit to Switzerland in February 2011, because of fears that he would be arrested for torture: https://www.andyworthington.co.uk/2011/02/19/the-indictment-for-torture-filed-against-george-w-bush-part-one-the-facts/
Netanyahu may well continue to be feted as the greatest human being who ever lived in the US, as it continues its unmooring from the rest of the world, but I’m absolutely certain that today’s announcement will have sent a chill through governments in Europe and elsewhere in the west who signed up to pledge undying support for Israel’s “right to defend itself”, seemingly without any regard whatsoever for the fact that the mechanisms put in place after WWII to try to prevent such horrors from taking place again – and which their own countries were instrumental in establishing – might actually still have teeth, however much they had tried to defang them.
I hope they all end up in The Hague – but before that, I hope that they recognize the need to backpedal furiously, and to bring the evil still taking place in Gaza to an end, as mitigating factors for when they too are held to account.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 5:27 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Al Glatkowski wrote:
Let’s hope Biden is next.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 5:45 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Indeed, Al. After yesterday’s UN veto of a ceasefire resolution in the UN Security Council, and the hysteria that’s already washing out from the US around the world in a tide of genocidal sewage, it’s clear that Israel and the US will be determined to oppose and discredit the ICC arrest warrants as much as they possibly can.
Behind all the bluster, however, these are real arrest warrants, issued by a real international court, and Biden ought to realize that, in the time he has left in office, he needs to do some serious backpedaling. I imagine the phones have been burning today as other western leaders have been calling to let him know that, although the US has nothing but contempt for the ICC, they all signed up to it, and they can now sense that the bells of accountability might soon be tolling for them.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 5:45 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Natalia Rivera Scott wrote:
I hope they get arrested, tried, imprisoned for life and rot there. These monsters don’t deserve to feel the sun on their faces for the rest of their horrible lives.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 5:49 pm
Andy Worthington says...
I agree, Natalia, although what seems most likely is that they won’t ever be traveling anywhere except the US. Legally, however, the ramifications of this are massive, and I’m enjoying thinking today about how much some western leaders will be sweating, as their previously suppressed legal advisers are finally allowed back into the room to let them know that giving carte blanche to mass murderers was never a sensible idea.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 5:49 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Tamzin Jans wrote:
Andy, there’s plenty of evidence here to take Netanyahu and Gallant to a war crimes court.
https://www.icc-cpi.int/news/situation-state-palestine-icc-pre-trial-chamber-i-rejects-state-israels-challenges
...on November 21st, 2024 at 8:32 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Yes, I quoted extensively from the ICC’s press release in my article, Tamzin, explaining, point by point, the credible and significant grounds on which the arrest warrants were issued. It’s legally devastating for Netanyahu and Gallant, absolutely shredding the unjustifiable basis of their actions over the last 14 months – and profoundly worrying too for the leaders of the countries in the west that have shielded Israel and supported it unconditionally.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 8:32 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Tamzin Jans wrote:
Andy, I certainly hope so! It couldn’t happen to “nicer” people who kept on looking the other way when genocide was occurring.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 8:33 pm
Andy Worthington says...
I’ve been enjoying all day, Tamzin, thinking about Keir Starmer and David Lammy sweating as they realize that their idiotic amnesia about international humanitarian law has suddenly crumbled like the hollow edifice it was all along.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 8:34 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Masoud Chamasmani wrote:
GREAT NEWS.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 9:35 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Very much so, Masoud. As Tayab Ali, the Director of the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians, and a partner with Bindmans, said today, it’s “the most significant international humanitarian law ruling in human history.” https://x.com/PDeepdive/status/1859697430171987973
...on November 21st, 2024 at 9:35 pm
Andy Worthington says...
When Dan Shea shared this on Facebook, he wrote:
It is about time, though I am skeptical anything will change, and that they will never be arrested, by whom? And will never be tried as the USA continues to ignore the ICC. Biden is a coward so he won’t do anything but continue to give political cover to these war criminals and Trump definitely isn’t going to aid the ICC.
.
Too little, too late, but still good it is on the record.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 9:43 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Thanks for sharing, and for your thoughts, Dan. I’d say that the place it will make the least difference is the US, which has basically been colonized by Israel now, and has, shamefully, always shared its lawlessness. In the rest of the west, however, where countries all signed up to the ICC, it’s going to be all but impossible not to enforce the arrest warrant – and once the basis of the charges is recognized, all these countries are then going to have to come to terms with their own complicity, which really should make them walk back from their hitherto unconditional support for Israel.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 9:44 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Worth noting too that, in its press release, the Court “recalled that, in a previous composition, it already decided that the Court’s jurisdiction in the situation extended to Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem”, with Karim Khan also issuing a statement today in which he stated, “my Office is continuing to pursue its independent and impartial investigation in the situation in the State of Palestine with focus. We are taking forward additional lines of inquiry in areas under the Court’s jurisdiction, which include Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. I am deeply concerned about reports of escalating violence, further shrinking humanitarian access, and continued expansion of allegations of international crimes in Gaza and the West Bank.”
https://www.icc-cpi.int/news/statement-icc-prosecutor-karim-aa-khan-kc-issuance-arrest-warrants-situation-state-palestine
...on November 21st, 2024 at 10:32 pm
Andy Worthington says...
This is disgraceful. According to the Times of Israel, a UK government spokesman has said that the UK “respects the ICC’s independence, but rejects the moral equivalence between Israel and terror groups.” From what I can ascertain, this means that Keir Starmer thinks 200,000 dead Palestinians aren’t equivalent to 1,000 dead Israelis. What would be equivalent for him? Two million dead Palestinians? https://x.com/GuantanamoAndy/status/1859730955562553357
...on November 21st, 2024 at 10:53 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Sylvia Posadas wrote:
Let this be a significant landmark in the downfall of US white supremacy.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 11:29 pm
Andy Worthington says...
And white colonial supremacy everywhere in the west, Sylvia – but yes, the US needs to fall the most, and the hardest, after Israel itself, of course.
...on November 21st, 2024 at 11:30 pm
Andy Worthington says...
For anyone interested in the international response to the ICC arrest warrants, Al Jazeera has a good list here, in which most countries signed up to the ICC have acknowledged the Court’s authority, and recognized what their obligations are: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/11/21/world-reacts-to-icc-arrest-warrants-for-israels-netanyahu-gallant
Noticeably, only the US and Hungary have strongly opposed it, while the UK and Germany (Israel’s most committed western supporters, after the US) are prevaricating.
Because the US refused to sign up to the ICC, it apparently thinks that enables it to be as wildly irresponsible as it likes, unlike the 125 states who have signed up – as, technically, “states parties to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.”
Biden called the issuing of the arrest warrants “outrageous”, adding that, “whatever the ICC might imply, there is no equivalence – none – between Israel and Hamas. We will always stand with Israel against threats to its security.”
This “no equivalence” argument is startlingly biased in favor of Israel, and equally startlingly dismissive of the value of Palestinian lives, as it indicates that no amount of Palestinian deaths (and the total is already somewhere between 50,000 and 200,000) can compare, in Biden’s mind, to the 1,068 Israelis (and 71 foreign citizens) killed on October 7.
Hungary is a signatory, but Victor Orbán has refused to recognize the arrest warrants, and says he will welcome Netanyahu, although that will have consequences for him, as law analyst Itay Epshtain explained on X here: https://x.com/EpshtainItay/status/1859885156364071355
As for the Germany and the UK, the former has only conceded that it has “taken note” of the issuing of the arrest warrants, while, in the UK, Keir Starmer and David Lammy have been silent. A spokesperson for Starmer said the UK has “respect for the independence of the ICC”, but added that the government’s position was that “there is no moral equivalence between Israel, a democracy and Hamas and Lebanese Hezbollah, which are terror groups.” The spokesperson also suggested that Starmer “will continue to engage” with Netanyahu “in support of Israel’s right to defend itself”, which is deeply troubling. https://x.com/GuantanamoAndy/status/1859757457465307160
Today, the home secretary, Yvette Cooper, made a fool of herself on Sky News by claiming that it was not a matter for her to decide whether or not Netanyahu would be arrested if he set foot in the UK, prompting a suitably scathing response from barrister Tayab Ali, who stated, “Literally, section 2 of the International Criminal Court Act places obligations directly on the Secretary of State. If you can’t do your job and uphold the rule of law step aside and let someone who can do the job do it.” https://x.com/GuantanamoAndy/status/1859911967823270212
...on November 22nd, 2024 at 1:08 pm
Andy Worthington says...
Linda Smith wrote:
Arrest warrant for USA complicity/instigation is required.
...on November 25th, 2024 at 2:47 pm
Andy Worthington says...
It will be interesting to see how things develop, Linda, with particular reference to complicity. The ICJ’s advisory opinion in July – in which the Court declared Israel’s entire 57-year occupation of Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem to be unlawful – would seem to be a good starting point, as the Court not only ordered Israel to leave the whole of the Occupied Palestinian Territory; it also advised that “all States are under an obligation not to recognize as legal the situation arising from the unlawful presence of the State of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and not to render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created by the continued presence of the State of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.”
I wrote about the July opinion here: https://www.andyworthington.co.uk/2024/07/23/what-now-after-the-world-court-condemns-as-unlawful-israels-entire-57-year-occupation-of-the-palestinian-territories/
...on November 25th, 2024 at 2:48 pm
Andy Worthington says...
A good article by Kenneth Roth about the ICC arrest warrants, and what they mean in a wider context: for those lower down the chain of command, for example – the Israeli generals who “must now think twice about proceeding with the bombing and starving of Palestinian civilians” – as well as providing “a reminder to governments that continue to arm the Israeli military as it commits war crimes in Gaza.” As Roth explains, “The former Liberian president Charles Taylor is serving a 50-year sentence in a British prison for aiding and abetting war crimes by providing arms to an abusive rebel force in Sierra Leone. Do British, German or American officials want to face similar charges?”
He also paints a glorious picture of Karim Khan tackling Trump if he proceeds with sanctions against the ICC, as he did in his first term: “Trump might pretend to slough off accusations of aiding and abetting Israeli war crimes in Gaza, but he does not have the power to pardon ICC charges. Suddenly he would face the same travel restraints as Netanyahu and Gallant – not so much that the handcuffs would be placed on him as he landed in Brussels, São Paulo, Johannesburg or Tokyo, but that he would be quietly told not to come.”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/26/icc-arrest-warrants-netanyahu-israel
...on November 26th, 2024 at 7:06 pm