Judges at the International Criminal Court (ICC) have issued arrest warrants for Israel’s prime minister and former defence minister, as well as the military commander of Hamas.
A statement said a pre-trial chamber had rejected Israel’s challenges to the court’s jurisdiction and issued warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant.
A warrant was also issued for Mohammed Deif of Hamas, although Israel has said he was killed in an air strike in Gaza in July.
The judges said there were “reasonable grounds” the three men bore “criminal responsibility” for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity during the war between Israel and Hamas. Both Israel and Hamas have rejected the allegations.
The Israeli prime minister’s office condemned the ICC’s decision as “antisemitic”, while Hamas said the warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant have set an “important historical precedent”.
The impact of these warrants will in part depend on whether the ICC’s 124 member states - which do not include Israel or its main ally, the United States - decide to enforce them or not.
In a statement, the White House said the US rejected the ICC decision.
However, the EU’s foreign policy chief said it should be respected and implemented.
What are the charges?
The prosecutor’s case against them stems from the events of 7 October 2023, when Hamas gunmen attacked southern Israel, killing about 1,200 people and taking 251 others back to Gaza as hostages.
Israel responded to the attack by launching a military campaign to eliminate Hamas, during which at least 44,000 people have been killed in Gaza, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.
For Deif, the chamber found reasonable grounds to believe that he was “responsible for the crimes against humanity of murder; extermination; torture; and rape and other form of sexual violence; as well as the war crimes of murder, cruel treatment, torture; taking hostages; outrages upon personal dignity; and rape and other form of sexual violence”.
It also said there were reasonable grounds to believe 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”.
For Netanyahu and Gallant, external, who was replaced as defence minister earlier this month, the chamber found reasonable grounds to believe that they “each bear criminal responsibility for the following crimes as co-perpetrators for committing the acts jointly with others: the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare; and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts”.
It also found reasonable grounds to believe that “each bear criminal responsibility as civilian superiors for the war crime of intentionally directing an attack against the civilian population”.
The chamber also noted that it had rejected two Israeli challenges - one disputing the ICC’s jurisdiction over the Palestinian territories, and Israeli nationals specifically, and the other arguing that the ICC prosecutor had not given Israel the opportunity to investigate the allegations itself before requesting warrants.
The ICC is a court of last resort and is only supposed to act when domestic courts cannot, or will not, genuinely investigate or prosecute serious international crimes.
How have Israel and Hamas reacted?
The Israeli prime minister’s office said Israel “utterly rejects the false and absurd charges of the International Criminal Court”.
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not give in to pressure. He will continue to pursue all the objectives that Israel set out to achieve in its just war against Hamas and the Iranian axis of terror,” it added.
Gallant said the court’s decision “places the State of Israel and the murderous leaders of Hamas in the same row and thus legitimizes the murder of babies, the rape of women and the abduction of the elderly from their beds”.
“The decision sets a dangerous precedent against the right to self-defence and moral warfare and encourages murderous terrorism,” he added.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog called the chamber’s decision “outrageous”, and said the ICC had “turned universal justice into a universal laughing stock”.
Hamas welcomed the warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant, saying that it “constitutes an important historical precedent, and a correction to a long path of historical injustice against our people”.
It also called on countries around the world to enforce the warrants and work to stop what it called “the crimes of genocide against defenceless civilians in the Gaza Strip”.
Israel has vehemently denied the allegation its forces are committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, which is the subject of a separate case before the International Court of Justice.
Palestinians in Gaza expressed hope that it would bring Israeli leaders to justice.
Whilst Deif, is suspected to be dead. The warrant will likely cause problems for Starmer as he may be questioned whether the UK would arrest Netanyahu if he stepped onto British soil. Due to the response to Putin’s arrest warrant he will be keen to avoid double standards.