ICC prosecutor seeks arrest warrants for Sinwar and Netanyahu for war crimes linked to October 7 attack and Gaza

CNN
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The International Criminal Court seeks arrest warrants for Hamas leader in Gaza Yahya Sinwar and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for war crimes and crimes against humanity following the October 7 attacks on Israel and the war that followed in Gaza, said the court’s prosecutor, Karim Khan. CNN’s Christiane Amanpour in an exclusive interview Monday.

Khan said the ICC prosecutors’ team was also seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, as well as two other senior Hamas leaders — Mohammed Diab Ibrahim al-Masri, the leader of the Al Brigades. Qassem, better known as Mohammed Deif, and Ismail. Haniyeh, political leader of Hamas.

The arrest warrants for Israeli politicians mark the first time the ICC has targeted the top leader of a close US ally. The move places Netanyahu alongside Russian President Vladimir Putin, against whom the ICC has issued an arrest warrant over Moscow’s war against Ukraine, and Libyan strongman Muammar Gaddafi, who was facing an arrest warrant arrest warrant from the ICC for alleged crimes against humanity at the time. at the time of his capture and assassination in October 2011.

By seeking arrest warrants for Israeli and Hamas leaders in the same action, Khan’s office risks drawing criticism that it is placing a terrorist organization and an elected government on equal footing.

A panel of ICC judges will now consider Khan’s arrest warrant request.

Khan said the charges against Sinwar, Haniyeh and al-Masri include “extermination, murder, hostage-taking, rape and sexual assault in custody.”

“The world was shocked on October 7 when people were taken from their rooms, from their homes, from the different kibbutzim in Israel,” Khan told Amanpour, adding that “people suffered enormously.”

Hamas-led militants killed around 1,200 people in several locations in southern Israel on October 7 and took some 250 hostages in Gaza. Many hostages are still being held in Gaza – Khan told Amanpour that this means crimes continue to be committed against “so many innocent Israelis… who are being held hostage by Hamas and their families awaiting their return.”

Khan told Amanpour that his team had “various evidence” to support the request for an arrest warrant against Sinwar, Haniyeh and al-Masri, including authenticated video footage and photographs of the attacks as well as evidence from eyewitnesses and of survivors.

Khan said Israel had “all the rights and even the obligation to recover the hostages, but you must do it within the law.”

In response to Khan’s announcement, Hamas said in a statement that it “strongly condemns the ICC prosecutor’s attempts to equate the victims with the aggressors by issuing arrest warrants against a number of leaders of Palestinian resistance without legal basis.

“Hamas calls on the ICC prosecutor to issue arrest warrants against all war criminals among the leaders of the occupation, officers and soldiers who participated in crimes against the Palestinian people, and demands the cancellation of all arrest warrants issued against Palestinian resistance leaders,” the group said. added.

“No one is above the law”

Accusations against Netanyahu and Gallant include “causing extermination, provoking famine as a method of warfare, including withholding humanitarian aid, deliberately targeting civilians in conflict,” Khan told Amanpour.

“The fact that Hamas fighters need water does not justify denying water to the entire civilian population of Gaza,” he added.

More than 35,500 Palestinians have been killed and more than 79,000 injured in Gaza since October 7, the Gaza Health Ministry announced on Monday. CNN cannot independently verify the figures.

Netanyahu called the decision a “political scandal.”

“They will not dissuade us and we will continue the war until the hostages are freed and Hamas is destroyed,” he said during a meeting of the parliamentary group of his Likud party.

Other Israeli officials echoed his sentiments. Benny Gantz, a member of Israel’s war cabinet, criticized Khan’s decision immediately after its announcement, saying Israel was fighting “with one of the strictest moral codes in history, while respecting international law and benefiting from an independent and robust judicial system.

“Drawing parallels between the leaders of a democratic country determined to defend themselves against despicable terrorism and the leaders of a bloodthirsty terrorist organization constitutes a profound distortion of justice and a flagrant moral bankruptcy,” he said. said, adding that the prosecutors’ decision “is in itself a crime of historic proportions that will be remembered for generations.”

Opposition leader Yair Lapid said the request for an arrest warrant was “a total moral failure.”

“We cannot accept the scandalous comparison between Netanyahu and Sinwar… We will not remain silent,” he said.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog called it “beyond scandalous.”

When reports surfaced last month that the ICC’s chief prosecutor was considering this course of action, Netanyahu said that any ICC arrest warrants for senior officials in the Israeli government and military ” would be a scandal of historic proportions” and that Israel “has an independent legal system”. which rigorously investigates all violations of the law.

Asked by Amanpour about Netanyahu’s comments, Khan replied: “No one is above the law.”

He said that if Israel disagrees with the ICC, “they are free, despite their objections to jurisdiction, to challenge before the judges of the Court and that is what I advise them to do.”

Israel and the United States are not members of the ICC. However, the ICC claims to have jurisdiction over Gaza, East Jerusalem and the West Bank after Palestinian leaders formally agreed to be bound by the court’s founding principles in 2015.

The ICC’s announcement on Monday is separate from the case currently being heard by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) concerning an accusation by South Africa that Israel committed genocide in its war against Hamas following the attacks of October 7.

While the ICJ examines cases involving countries and nations, the ICC is a criminal court that prosecutes individuals for war crimes or crimes against humanity.

Monday’s announcement is not the first time the ICC has taken action against Israel. In March 2021, Khan’s office launched an investigation into possible crimes committed in the Palestinian territories since June 2014 in Gaza and the West Bank.

Located in The Hague, Netherlands, and created by a treaty called the Rome Statute first presented to the United Nations, the ICC operates independently. Most countries – 124 of them – are parties to the treaty, but there are notable exceptions, including Israel, the United States and Russia.

This means that if the court grants Khan’s request and issues arrest warrants for the five men, any member country would have to arrest them and extradite them to The Hague.

Under the Court’s rules, all signatories to the Rome Statute have an obligation to cooperate fully with its decisions. This would make it extremely difficult for Netanyahu and Gallant to travel abroad, including to many countries that are among Israel’s closest allies, including Germany and the United Kingdom.

Sinwar, Haniyeh and al-Masri have been officially designated as global terrorists by the United States, meaning they are subject to a travel ban, asset freeze and sanctions. The United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, Canada, the European Union and others have designated Hamas a terrorist group and imposed sanctions on its leaders.

This story has been updated with additional developments.