The Worldwide Prison Court docket constructing is pictured in The Hague, Netherlands, on Thursday, when arrest warrants had been issued for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former protection minister Yoav Gallant of Israel, and Hamas chief Muhammad Deif.
Laurens Van Putten/Getty Photos
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Laurens Van Putten/Getty Photos
The Worldwide Prison Court docket has issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for alleged conflict crimes and crimes in opposition to humanity and conflict crimes within the Gaza Strip. Warrants have additionally been issued for Yoav Gallant, Israel’s former protection minister, and Muhammad Deif, Hamas’ army chief who Israel says it killed in August.
ICC chief prosecutor Karim Kahn requested the arrest warrants in Could.
Israel is contesting the allegations in opposition to Netanyahu and Gallant, which embrace “the conflict crime of hunger as a technique of warfare; and the crimes in opposition to humanity of homicide, persecution, and different inhumane acts.”
Here’s what the warrants imply and what might occur subsequent.
What’s the ICC?
Situated in The Hague, Netherlands, the ICC was established July 17, 1998, underneath the Rome Statute, a world treaty, and got here into power in July 2002.
The creation of the ICC grew out of the necessity for a everlasting worldwide court docket to deal with crimes throughout acts of conflict, in response to the court docket. It goals to assist “finish impunity for the perpetrators of essentially the most critical crimes of concern to the worldwide neighborhood.”
Thirty-two circumstances have gone earlier than the court docket, which consists of 18 judges which can be every from a unique nation, are elected by the member states and serve 9-year, nonrenewable phrases.
Its judges have issued 59 arrest warrants, together with these for Netanyahu, Gallant and Deif, the ICC says.
In March 2023, the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin for alleged conflict crimes in his conflict in opposition to Ukraine. Arrest warrants had been additionally issued for then-Libyan chief Moammar Gadhafi alongside together with his son Seif al-Islam Gadhafi and intelligence chief Abdullah al-Sanoussi in 2011.
Twenty-one folks have appeared earlier than the ICC and had been held at its detention heart. ICC judges have delivered 11 convictions and 4 acquittals, in response to the court docket. Costs in opposition to seven folks have dropped due to their deaths and 30 individuals are at-large, the ICC says.
The court docket focuses on 4 varieties of crimes
The court docket has worldwide jurisdiction over 4 varieties of crimes: crimes in opposition to humanity, genocide, crimes of aggression and conflict crimes.
The court docket doesn’t have its personal policing physique and depends on different international locations for assist in “making arrests, transferring arrested individuals to the ICC detention centre in The Hague, freezing suspects’ property, and implementing sentences,” the ICC notes.
Beneath the Rome Statue, ICC member states are obligated to arrest an individual who’s of their territory and topic to an arrest warrant.
The ICC has 124 state events, together with 33 from Africa, 19 from Jap Europe and 25 from Western Europe and others comparable to Canada. The US will not be a state occasion and neither is Israel.
Russia and Ukraine are additionally not members of the ICC, and Putin has not been arrested.
What occurs subsequent? Will Netanyahu be arrested?
The ICC arrest warrants are a big transfer by the worldwide court docket in looking for the arrest of a world chief.
“They ship a really sturdy sign in opposition to impunity and a really sturdy sign to all sides to adjust to worldwide humanitarian regulation, worldwide felony regulation and to, above all, defend the rights and security of civilians,” David Scheffer, former ambassador-at-large for conflict crimes points through the Clinton administration and a senior fellow on the Council on Overseas Relations, beforehand instructed NPR.
Now that arrest warrants have been issued, it’s as much as the ICC’s state events to implement the warrants, make the arrests if Netanyahu or others come to their nation, and switch them to the ICC for detention.
Netanyahu and Gallant might “journey to a complete host of Center East international locations with out worry of arrest as a result of they are not occasion to the Rome Statute,” Scheffer mentioned.
Egypt and Saudi Arabia, as an example, will not be members of the ICC.
“Solely Jordan is inside their neighborhood. And they also have that flexibility nonetheless to maneuver diplomatically,” Scheffer mentioned concerning the Israeli politicians.
If Netanyahu and others don’t seem earlier than the ICC or will not be arrested, the court docket says “authorized submissions may be made, however hearings can’t start.”
Whereas it’s unlikely that Netanyahu and Gallant would flip themselves in or be arrested, if both occasion had been to happen, they’d undergo the court docket’s authorized course of and doubtlessly be sentenced.
