The legitimacy of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to order an arrest for Israel’s prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, has been formally disputed by Israel, shortly before his scheduled speech at the UN general assembly in New York this Friday.
The ICC’s prosecutor, Karim Khan, in May sought arrest warrants for Mr. Netanyahu and his defence minister, Yoav Gallant, and also for three leaders of Hamas, Yahya Sinwar, Ismail Haniyeh (who has since perished in Tehran), and Mohammed Diab Ibrahim al-Masri. Mr. Khan stated at that time that the Hamas leaders may have been liable for war crimes and crimes against humanity allegedly perpetrated during the October 7th attacks by Hamas, which resulted in the death of around 1,200 Israelis, predominantly civilians.
The prosecutor additionally argued that Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Gallant could have used starvation as “a tactic of war” by sealing border crossings and limiting the distribution of food, water, and medical supplies as part of Israel’s “siege” of the Gaza Strip. According to the most recent data from Gaza’s health ministry, which is controlled by Hamas, over 41,000 Palestinians have been killed as a result of the persistent violence that has continued since October 7th.
There is presently no set timeline for the ICC judges to render their decisions on whether or not to issue the arrest warrants. Mr. Khan, however, did write a six-page letter on September 9th to the three-judge panel, urging them to rule on the requests “with the utmost urgency” given “the escalating situation in Palestine”.
Late last Friday, the Israeli foreign ministry in Jerusalem claimed to have submitted two separate appeals to the court in The Hague, both questioning the possible warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant.
The primary appeal disputes the ICC’s legal power to issue arrest warrants, citing that Israel has not ratified the Rome Statute that established the court. The second appeal cites the ICC’s principle of “complementarity”, arguing that Israel should have been asked to probe the allegations against Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Gallant, as the court was meant to complement rather than replace national legal systems.
As stipulated in its constitution, the International Criminal Court (ICC) only undertakes cases where the implicated nations demonstrate a genuine unwillingness or inability to do so. The actions of the petitioners look set to cause additional postponements to the judgement decisions. Despite the fact that Mr Netanyahu will only be absent from Israel for a short 72 hours to attend the Friday’s UN speech, critics are already censuring him for departing during a wartime period.