ICC ISRAEL WARNING: ‘You were built for Africa & thugs like Putin!’

Right, so news that has echoed around the world now is that the International Criminal Court, the ICC have finally, after much preamble and apparent delay, now submitted applications for arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his defence minister Yoav Gallant, and three key members of Hamas as well, Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas leader, Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri, better known as Dief, the Commander in Chief of Hamas’ military wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades and Ismail Haniyeh, the Head of Hamas’ Political Bureau.
There’s no cogent argument that the ICC here is acting in the interests of one side or the other, despite claims to the contrary, the threats the ICC despite showing even handedness and even the claims that it isn’t supposed to be a proper court, but merely a western device there to promote their interests and use against Africa and thugs like Putin. The ICC has more work to do beyond Hamas and Israel, but this move by the ICC is far, far cleverer than at first glance it might seem, and I have to take my hat off to the Chief Prosecutor, for showing some real guts and playing the game he’s going to have to in order for any justice to be seen.
Right, so first off, having made several videos questioning ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan, for what has seemed like dragging his heels, given how quickly we’ve seen the ICC’s sister organisation at the Hague, the ICJ, leap into action on the matter of Israel and Gaza, I feel the need to acknowledge that actually, he’s owed an apology. He’s played an absolute blinder here, has got pro Israel politicians screaming up the walls and Netanyahu doing his typical turn of basically just calling the ICC antisemitic, but for every berk slamming his decision to apply for arrest warrants for both Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, the fact he’s also applied for arrest warrants for three key Hamas operatives as well, completely undermines any argument, that the ICC is taking sides. It simply isn’t. On top of that, part of what has taken so long to get where we are now, is that Khan knew he’d have to have every T crossed and I dotted on the evidence gathered, in triplicate probably, so as to leave no room for doubt at all, that there was a case here to answer and in that light had assembled a team of leading human rights lawyers to work on the case as well, including as it happens Amal Clooney, someone who has come in for a bit of flak due to her silence on the matter of Israel and Gaza, but of course doing what she’d been doing, she clearly couldn’t, so a lesson there for the celeb blocking people, that silence isn’t always complicity.
In a lengthy statement, which I’m not going to read, the ICC’s Chief Prosecutor, Karim Khan, has outlined the remit of his investigation, which is only from the events of October 7th onwards and the charges he plans to bring against the aforementioned individuals. For the three from Hamas, the charges he has requested arrest warrants on the grounds of read:
‘Extermination as a crime against humanity, contrary to article 7(1)(b) of the Rome Statute;
Murder as a crime against humanity, contrary to article 7(1)(a), and as a war crime, contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i);
Taking hostages as a war crime, contrary to article 8(2)(c)(iii);
Rape and other acts of sexual violence as crimes against humanity, contrary to article 7(1)(g), and also as war crimes pursuant to article 8(2)(e)(vi) in the context of captivity;
Torture as a crime against humanity, contrary to article 7(1)(f), and also as a war crime, contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i), in the context of captivity;
Other inhumane acts as a crime against humanity, contrary to article 7(l)(k), in the context of captivity;
Cruel treatment as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i), in the context of captivity; and
Outrages upon personal dignity as a war crime, contrary to article 8(2)(c)(ii), in the context of captivity.’
Certainly these are the accusations made against Hamas, that we have heard much of, clearly the ICC has evidence of these to bring forward and indeed as much as we talk about Palestine being occupied territory and the Palestinian people have the right to resist that occupation, actions such as these, do not excuse I feel. We know they took hostage, we know why, but being signatories to the ICC, Palestine, be it the West Bank or Gaza, know this is off limits and of course everything else listed there should be obviously be prosecuted if proven.
Same goes for Israel though. The ICC Chief Prosecutor and his team bring forward the following charges against Netanyahu and Gallant:
‘Starvation of civilians as a method of warfare as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(b)(xxv) of the Statute;
Wilfully causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or health contrary to article 8(2)(a)(iii), or cruel treatment as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i);
Wilful killing contrary to article 8(2)(a)(i), or Murder as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i);
Intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population as a war crime contrary to articles 8(2)(b)(i), or 8(2)(e)(i);
Extermination and/or murder contrary to articles 7(1)(b) and 7(1)(a), including in the context of deaths caused by starvation, as a crime against humanity;
Persecution as a crime against humanity contrary to article 7(1)(h);
Other inhumane acts as crimes against humanity contrary to article 7(1)(k).’
Now the problem Israel have, is that these charges have all very much played out on camera to the public eye, because whereas the charges against Hamas relate to the events of one night on October 7th for the most part, for Israel’s leaders, it’s been 7 months of optics.
We know aid is being blocked, we know setters are responsible in no small part for this and we know the Israeli government has done nothing to stop them. Causing great suffering, just look at the numbers of women and children killed or permanently maimed as a result of their actions. The scale of the deaths speak for themselves, 40,000 dead Gazans, 70% of them women and children. Extermination and murder, the mass graves in hospital grounds are what immediately spring to mind there. And as for persecution, well that’s been a 76 year long crime, but certainly the forced displacement is what I think of first off. Israeli crimes seem far more obvious because we’ve watched them play out on our screens for months and so I think the application for arrest warrants here are the most likely to go through, though I imagine as I said, with the work that has gone in, the time spent of preparing this case, I’d be surprised if any were denied in the end and if, so, particularly those Israeli ones, I’d suspect political interference at play.
The reaction to these applications for arrest warrants though from the rest of the world kind of implies that the reality of the situation hasn’t been lost on many others either and the go to excuse for Israel right now, particularly from US and UK spokespeople and politicians is that the ICC has no remit to prosecute Israel. No calls that they are innocent except from the Eylon Levy’s of this world, certainly calls that the ICC are racist, because of course some will have said that, but trying to say the ICC has no jurisdiction or worse, that this isn’t what they were created for, really does show some fear and some hands being played by politicians who have, through their support for Netanyahu and his regime, made themselves complicit in genocide. I’m going to park that issue for now, I’m going to cover that in another video, but what they are saying about the ICC is just false and downright offensive when they come out with lines like, the ICC ‘is built for Africa and thugs like Putin’ and not for the West and it’s allies:
So the ICC is just a club for the West to beat others with, but not their allies then? Well Karim Khan has said absolutely not and is acting accordingly. I’d love to know which political leader decided to opine in such an offensive manner, they have no place leading a brass band, let alone be in power in a nation state.
But on that point of jurisdiction, if that is the go to position of those still seeking to defend Israel, now skating on very thin ice with regards being found complicit in the genocide Israel is engaged in.
Palestine is a signatory of the Rome Statute, the UN recognise Palestine as a state, the UK and US do not, but just because they don’t acknowledge a Palestinian state, that to them it is all Israel and some occupied territory that Israel controls, it’s only about them and because Israel are not signatories, that means the ICC has no jurisdiction. Well, the ICC found jurisdiction against Russia, against Putin, and that was celebrated and welcomed, thus proving the ICC is viewed as a device supposed to act in western interests and not actually an arbiter in global law, but the current chief prosecutor says otherwise and thank goodness for that. Now we wait and see if those arrest warrants get granted and what the response to that will be.
Meanwhile as Israel predictably loses it’s mind over this latest move, they’ve carried on attacking Gaza as well as the West Bank and are still attacking aid trucks as they come in, Settlers now choosing to cripple aid truck by wrecking the tyres and then looting and destroying the goods being carried, thus proving these charges being levied by the ICC, check out that story in this video recommendation here and I’ll hopefully catch you on the next vid. Cheers folks.