ICC chief prosecutor wants Israeli objections over Netanyahu arrest warrant to be rejected
The International Criminal Court’s (ICC) chief prosecutor Karim Khan has told judges that Israeli objections to the investigation into the war on Gaza should be rejected.
Khan’s formal response was to an appeal by Israel over the court’s jurisdiction after judges issued arrest warrants last year for Netanyahu, his former defence minister and Hamas’s military chief, accusing them of crimes against humanity.
Netanyahu called the arrest warrant “a black day in the history of nations ” and pledged to fight the allegations. Individuals cannot contest an arrest warrant directly, but the state of Israel can object to the entire investigation.
Israel argued in a December filing that it could look into allegations against its leaders on its own and that continuing to investigate Israelis was a violation of state sovereignty.
In his combined 55-page response, Khan said the Rome Statute, the treaty that established the ICC, allowed it to prosecute crimes that take place in the territory of member states, regardless of where the perpetrators hail from. Israel is not a signatory to the Rome Statute.
The judges are expected to render a decision in the coming months.
‘Secretary of genocide’: Gaza protester interrupts Blinken
As US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was laying out the Biden administration’s perceived achievements in the Middle East, a protester disrupted his speech at the Atlantic Council think tank.
“You will forever be known as ‘secretary of genocide’; you have the blood of hundreds of thousands of innocent people on your hands,” the protester shouted.
Blinken has defied rights groups by certifying that Israel is not blocking humanitarian aid to Gaza. His department has approved billions of dollars in military aid to Israel to fund the Gaza offensive, which UN experts have described as a genocide.
Blinken suggests October 7 attack aimed to derail Israel-Saudi Arabia deal
The top US diplomat says he was scheduled to travel to the Middle East days in October 2023 to close the “remaining gaps” in an agreement that would establish formal relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel. But then Hamas’s October 7 attack happened.
“The timing of Hamas attack was no accident,” Blinken said.
“Israel’s growing integration in the region, the prospect of normalisation with Saudi Arabia, posed an existential threat to Hamas’s power, its ambitions to dominate the Palestinian political landscape, its raison d’etre – which is the rejection of two states and the destruction of Israel.”
Netanyahu, whose government receives billions of dollars in US aid and diplomatic support from Washington, has repeatedly rejected the two-state solution, pledging to never allow the establishment of a Palestinian state.
He's right the Abraham accords played a major role, wrong about Hamas not wanting a 2-state solution. The Abraham accords side-lined the two state solution.
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