The International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and a senior Hamas official, accusing them of war crimes related to the October 7 attacks on Israel last year.
In a statement released Thursday, the court, based in the Netherlands, stated it found “reasonable grounds” to believe that Netanyahu holds criminal responsibility for war crimes, including using “starvation as a method of warfare” and committing “crimes against humanity, such as murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts.”
These arrest warrants represent a historic first, making Netanyahu the first Israeli leader summoned by an international court for alleged actions against Palestinians in the 76-year conflict. While ICC warrants do not guarantee arrests, they may significantly limit Netanyahu's ability to travel to ICC member states.
The Prime Minister's office dismissed the warrants as “absurd and antisemitic.” They stated, “Israel utterly rejects the absurd and false actions and accusations against it by the International Criminal Court, which is a politically biased and discriminatory body,” adding that there is “no war more just… after the Hamas terrorist organization launched a murderous attack, carrying out the largest massacre against the Jewish people since the Holocaust.”
Netanyahu “will not yield to pressure, will not back down, and will not retreat until all the goals of the war set by Israel at the start of the campaign are achieved,” his office asserted.
Israel, like the United States, is not a member of the ICC and has contested the court’s jurisdiction over its actions in the conflict, a challenge the court rejected on Thursday. The ICC asserts jurisdiction over territories occupied by Israel, including Gaza, East Jerusalem, and the West Bank, following a formal agreement by the Palestinian leadership to be bound by the court's founding principles in 2015.
Additionally, the court issued a warrant for Hamas official Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri, also known as Mohammed Deif, whom Israel claims was one of the masterminds behind the October 7 attack. While Israel states that it killed him in a September airstrike, Hamas has not confirmed his death.
The ICC stated it found “reasonable grounds” to believe that Deif was responsible for “crimes against humanity, including murder, extermination, torture, rape, and other forms of sexual violence,” as well as war crimes such as murder, cruel treatment, torture, hostage-taking, outrages upon personal dignity, and other forms of sexual violence.
The court asserted that Deif holds “criminal responsibility” for these offenses, having “committed the acts jointly and through others… having ordered or induced the commission of the crimes,” and for failing to “exercise proper control over the forces under his effective command.”
The court stated that there are “reasonable grounds to believe that the crimes against humanity were part of a widespread and systematic attack directed by Hamas and other armed groups against the civilian population of Israel.”
The ICC prosecutor had initially sought warrants for Hamas leaders Ismail Haniyeh and Yahya Sinwar, both of whom have since been killed by Israel; as a result, the court indicated that the applications for their warrants were withdrawn.
Hamas welcomed the warrants issued against Israeli officials in a statement but did not address the warrant for Deif. They described this as “a significant historical precedent” that addresses a longstanding historical injustice against their people and highlights the “suspicious negligence” regarding the horrific violations they have faced over the past 76 years of occupation. They called on all nations to cooperate in holding Israeli leaders accountable and to “take immediate action to halt the genocide” in Gaza.
Hamas had previously condemned the ICC prosecutor’s decision to pursue warrants against its leaders in May, stating that it attempted to “equate victims with aggressors.”
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