ICC arrest warrants accuse Netanyahu, Gallant of war crimes in Gaza
The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants Thursday for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister for crimes against humanity and war crimes, in a public rebuke of Israel’s battlefield conduct.
The warrants require dozens of nations who that are party to the court to apprehend the men if they enter those countries.
The court also issued a warrant for a Hamas military leader, Mohammed Deif, who was killed in an airstrike in Gaza in July, according to Israeli officials. Prosecutors issued the warrant because they were not able to confirm whether Deif is dead or alive, the chamber said. The court had also applied for warrants for two other Hamas leaders, Ismail Haniyeh and Yahya Sinwar, but they were abandoned after the leaders were killed by Israel.
The charges against Netanyahu and the former defense minister, Yoav Gallant, stemmed from Israel’s military operations in the Gaza Strip. A statement from the court said it found “reasonable grounds” to believe Netanyahu and Gallant bore responsibility for crimes including the use of starvation as a method of war, and “murder, persecution, and other inhuman acts.”
Deif was charged with crimes against humanity in connection with the Hamas-led attack on Israeli communities on Oct. 7, 2023, including murder, torture, rape and the abduction of hostages.
Israel and the United States, its main ally, are not parties to the statute the court is based upon, but 124 governments, including many in Europe, are signatories and would be required to enforce the warrants.
Karim Khan, the court’s chief prosecutor, implored signatories to “live up to their commitment” to the statute “by respecting and complying with these judicial orders.”
“I have underlined that the law is there for all, that its role is to vindicate the rights of all persons,” Khan said in a statement.
Netanyahu, in a lengthy statement, said Israel “utterly rejects the false and absurd charges” and called the court a “biased and discriminatory political body.” No war, the statement added, was “more just” than the one Israel has waged in Gaza after the Oct. 7 attacks.
Gallant, in a statement, condemned the decision, saying it placed Israel “and the murderous Hamas leaders on the same level.” A spokesperson for the U.S. National Security Council said the United States “fundamentally rejects the Court’s decision” and was “deeply concerned by the Prosecutor’s rush to seek arrest warrants.”
“The United States has been clear that the ICC does not have jurisdiction over this matter. In coordination with partners, including Israel, we are discussing next steps.”
The West Bank-based Palestinian Authority said it welcomed the ICC’s decision, saying it “restores hope and trust in international law and its institutions, underscoring the importance of justice, accountability, and prosecuting war criminals,” according to the WAFA news agency.
Thursday’s decision comes as Israel is facing growing international criticism over the civilian toll and humanitarian consequences of its military operations, in Gaza as well as in Lebanon. Aid agencies that work in Gaza say Israeli policies, including blocking of relief supplies and the continued, forced relocations of Palestinians there, have now brought the enclave to the brink of starvation – a warning that has been made repeatedly over the last year of war.
Health officials in Gaza said Thursday that at least 71 people were killed over the previous day in Israeli strikes, pushing the death toll in the war past 44,000 people. The Gaza Health Ministry does not distinguish between combatants and civilians but says the majority of those killed are women and children.
“The health system in northern Gaza has collapsed, and we cannot provide anything,” said Hossam Abu Safiya, the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, after one of the strikes on a residential block near the facility. “All our appeals are in vain.”
The war has also displaced some 2 million Palestinians, whom the Israeli military have pushed into ever-shrinking spaces. Israel and the United States assert Hamas has taken shelter among them, which Israel has cited as a justification for strikes on hospitals, schools, mosques, tent encampments and residential areas that have resulted in high civilian death tolls. The Israeli military said it exerts “significant efforts” to avoid civilian harm; U.S. officials have called on Israel to do more to safeguard civilians.
In October, the Biden administration gave Israel 30 days to improve humanitarian access or potentially lose some U.S. military assistance. The deadline passed with Israel largely failing to comply with U.S. demands, but the Biden administration declined to take any action.
The ICC warrant focused in large part on the crime of starvation. There were “reasonable grounds to believe” that Netanyahu and Gallant, over a six-month period beginning on Oct. 8, 2023, “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,” Thursday’s statement said.
The two impeded humanitarian aid and failed “to facilitate relief by all means at their disposal.”
Dutch Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp was the first to voice his country’s commitment to abiding by the ICC on Thursday, saying the Netherlands, where the court is located, will execute the arrest warrants if Netanyahu or Gallant sets foot on Dutch soil.
In France, Christophe Lemoine, a spokesman for the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs, indicated his government would abide by the warrants. “We support the action of the prosecutor of the court, which acts fully independently,” he said in a news conference. “The fight against impunity is our priority … so our reaction will be in line with these principles.”
The Irish Foreign Ministry published a statement Thursday in support of the ICC, calling “on all States to respect its independence and impartiality, with no attempts made to undermine the court.”
B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights group, called on state parties to the court to enforce the warrants and said the issuance of them “isn’t surprising.”
“We all know about the conduct of Israel in the Gaza Strip over the last year,” the group said in a statement, adding that the warrants signaled “the lowest points in Israeli history.”
Basem Naim, a member of the Hamas political bureau in Gaza, said issuing the warrants to Netanyahu and Gallant was “a first step showing international commitment to justice.” However, he said, “it remains limited and symbolic if it is not supported” by “all countries around the world.” He did not mention the warrant issued for Deif.
Others indicted by the court have included leaders or key figures from repressive states, including Russian President Vladimir Putin and Sudan’s former leader, Omar al-Bashir. But the warrant against Netanyahu was “the first time that the court has issued a warrant for the head of government of a major Western ally,” Anthony Dworkin, a senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, wrote in an analysis of the decision.
The warrants will bring “intense political focus on the ICC,” he wrote. “As historic backers of the court and of the international rule of law, European countries should make clear that they fully support the court as an independent judicial body.”
European states also have to prepare for attacks on the ICC from the incoming Trump administration and “resist any U.S. pressure to cut its own ties and support for the court,” he wrote.
Janina Dill, professor of global security at the University of Oxford, noted that Netanyahu was “still directing the war in Gaza, he is still making decisions about humanitarian access and about what targets are selected, and the conduct at the centre of the arrest warrants persists.”
“This, to me, very clearly implies that any material or diplomatic support of Israel’s war in Gaza risks supporting ongoing war crimes and crimes against humanity,” Dill said. “It should become clearer and clearer to states that supporting this war is basically taking a strong stance against international law.”
In Gaza, Abeer Khamis, a 51-year-old widow who was displaced from her home in Gaza City during the war, said in a phone interview that she did not understand what was “meant by issuing an arrest warrant for Netanyahu and Gallant.”
“They talk about political pressure. There has been political pressure for over a year,” she said. “Will this end the war or not? Will our situation in Gaza improve? Will there be food? Will we return to our homes in the north?”
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Fahim reported from Beirut, Loveluck from London and Rom from Tel Aviv. Hajar Harb and Vivian Ho in London, Hazem Balousha in Toronto and Ellen Francis in Brussels contributed.