Israel’s Lapid, Lieberman rebuke ICC warrants
Several Israeli officials have responded to the ICC’s arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant. In a post on X, Israel’s opposition leader Yair Lapid condemned the court’s decision, characterising Israel’s war on Gaza as a fight for its life “against terrorist oganisations”.
Israel’s former Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman also spoke out against the ruling, writing on X that it shows the international community’s “double standards and hypocrisy”.
“The state of Israel will not apologise for protecting its citizens and is committed to continuing to fight terrorism without compromise,” said Lieberman.
Israeli officials quick to equate ICC arrest warrants with anti-Semitism
“This is modern antisemitism in the guise of justice,” Israeli Transportation Minister Miri Regev has posted on X, calling the ICC arrest warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant for alleged war crimes “a legal absurdity”.
“Simply anti-Semitism, always anti-Semitism,” Housing Minister Yitzhak Goldknopf said, citing a verse from the Torah that states the Jews are “a people that dwells alone, not reckoned among the nations”.
Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel’s far-right national security minister, said: “The International Criminal Court in The Hague shows once again that it is anti-Semitic through and through. … I support the prime minister in the just war.”
“The answer to the arrest warrants: applying sovereignty over all the territories of Judea and Samaria [the occupied West Bank], settlement in all parts of the country and severing ties with the terrorist authority, including sanctions,” he added.
A statement from the office also equates the decision to a “modern-day Dreyfus trial”, referring to an incident in France around the turn of the 20th century in which a French military man of Jewish descent was wrongfully convicted of treason.
“No anti-Israel decision will prevent the State of Israel from defending its citizens. The PM will not succumb to pressure, will not be deterred, and will not retreat until all the war objectives set by Israel at the start of the campaign are achieved”, the statement continues.
“Israel vehemently rejects the absurd and false actions and accusations against it by the International Criminal Court, a biased and discriminatory political body”.
Netanyahu now meeting with US’s Hochstein after rejecting ICC warrant
The Israeli prime minister is now meeting with the US special envoy in what was originally supposed to be a discussion of a ceasefire in Lebanon. Moments ago, PM Benjamin Netanyahu’s office rejected the issuance of the International Criminal Court’s warrant, describing the court as “anti-Semitic”.
“Israel rejects with disgust the absurd and false actions leveled against it by ICC,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement, adding that Israel won’t “give in to pressure” in the defence of its citizens, a statement from the office reads.
