Israel has reacted with outrage after the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for the arrest of its prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu-Mileikowski for war crimes during the ongoing genocide on Gaza. The warrant legally obliges the court’s signatories to arrest and turn in its targets and in theory restricts the international travel options of the alleged war criminals.

Together with the Israeli prime minister, the international prosecutor-general Karim Khan also issued warrants for recently sacked Israeli defence minister Yoav Gallant and his Hamas counterpart, Muhammad Daif. Karim had originally announced his intent to pursue the trio, together with Hamas leaders Ismail Haniyeh and Yahya Sinwar, six months ago. The Palestinian trio were wanted for the October 2023 raid from Gaza, though it is certain that at least Haniyeh, who was abroad and who is uninvolved in military operations, was added to the list simply to give it a semblance of favourability to Israel. But since, Israel has cut down the number of Palestinian targets to one by assassinating both Haniyeh and Sinwar. They also claimed, without confirmation, to have killed Daif.

Netanyahu-Mileikowski’s office reacted with predictable and characteristic petulance by branding the decision “anti-semitic”: along with misdirected claims of “politicisation”, this has been a standard Israeli line to counter any international bodies’ criticism, with the United Nations a favoured target of its spleen. The decision is the more galling for Israel because, along with Britain and the United States, it had originally lobbied hard for Karim to head the court because he had a reputation for favorability to their interests.

In theory, the decision means that the Israeli prime minister, who has gallivanted freely around Europe and the United States, will find at least his European travel options limited. Most European countries are signatories to the court, though at least a virulently pro-Israel Germany has hinted that it might overlook the warrant altogether. Though the United States is also a signatory to the court, it has never ratified this signature, and Netanyahu-Mileikowski can still expect to find fawning audiences among American politicians. Joseph Biden, who has criticized the Israeli prime minister personally while continuing to emphasize his “ironclad” support for Israel, also gave the lie to his lukewarm criticisms by lashing out at the “outrageous” arrest applications. “Let me be clear:”, his office said, in a favoured cliche of American politicians, “whatever this prosecutor might imply, there is no equivalence – none –  between Israel and Hamas.”

In that, at least, Biden is correct: there is no equivalence. Hamas could never have hoped to achieve even a fraction of the wholesale destruction that Israel has inflicted upon what Gallant called the “human animals” of Gaza: at least a hundred thousand dead, a disproportionate number of them children; millions displaced and subjected to repeated massacres with unbridled sadism; thousands imprisoned in what are barely-concealed rape camps; and countless assaults on mosques, hospitals, homes, and every semblance of Palestinian life.

For its part, Hamas hailed the “important historical precedent”. There will certainly be some satisfaction in Asia, Africa, and South America, where many politicians and commentators have complained of the court’s politicization from another angle: that it has exclusively targeted those unfavorable to the “West”. The court’s targets in the past have included the Serbian genocidaires Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic from Bosnia; Serbia’s ruler Slobodan Milosevic; Saifelislam Qaddhafi, son of former Libyan dictator Muammar who sided with his father’s 2011 crackdown; and Sudanese dictator Omar Bashir. It remains unclear that the international warrants will be fulfilled in their entirety, but simply in targeting genocidaires favored by the United States and Western Europe, the court has set an unprecedented mark.

 – by Ibrahim Moiz for MuslimMatters

Related:

– Ismail Haniyeh Assassinated By Israel: A Life Dedicated To The Palestinian Cause

– Foreign Affairs Official Resigns Over Gaza Genocide