Exclusive: ICC prosecutor seeks arrest warrants for Sinwar as well as Netanyahu to be charged with war crime related to the attack on October 7 and Gaza
The International Criminal Court is seeking the arrest warrants in connection with charges of crimes against humanity and war crime in connection with the attacks on Israel as well as the war in Gaza.
By Ivana Kottasová
May 20, 2024 03:25 PM
CNN —
The International Criminal Court is seeking warrants of arrest to Hamas head Yahya Sinwar in Gaza Yahya Sinwarand Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity relating to the attacks against Israel and the war that followed in Gaza the prosecutor of the court Karim Khan spoke to the CNN’s Christiane Amanpour in an exclusive interview on Monday.
Khan stated that the ICC’s prosecutorial team also wants warrants in the case of the Defense Minister of Israel Yoav Gallant and two other high-ranking Hamas leaders -the Mohammed Diab Ibrahim al-Masri, the leader of the Al Qassem Brigades who is popularly known by the name Mohammed Deif, and Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’ political leader.
The warrants issued against Israeli political leaders mark the first time that the ICC targets the highest politician of the close alliance to the United States. The verdict places Netanyahu with Russia’s Russian Putin, the Russian president Vladimir Putin, for whom the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Russia’s war against Ukraine and Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi who was in the process of obtaining an arrest warrant by the ICC for the alleged crime against humanity when he was arrested and killed in October 2011. arrest and murder in the month of October.
In requesting warrants for arrest on Israeli or Hamas leaders as a result of the same process the Khan’s office could be a target for criticism from those who believe it puts the terror group and a government elected to an equal footing.
A panel composed of ICC judges is now examining Khan’s petition for arrest warrants.
“The world was shocked on the 7th of October when people were ripped from their bedrooms, from their homes, from the different kibbutzim in Israel,” Khan said to Amanpour in a statement, stating to the fact that “people have suffered enormously.”
Hamas-led terrorists killed more than 1,200 people in various locations within southern Israel on October 7, and transferred around 250 hostages to Gaza. The hostages remain in Gaza and are being held in Gaza. Khan said to Amanpour this meant that there were still crimes in the making against “so many innocent Israelis … that are held hostage by Hamas and families that are waiting for their return.”
Khan said to Amanpour that his team has “variety of evidence” to justify the request for warrants of arrest for Sinwar, Haniyeh and al-Masri as well as authentic photos and video footage from the attack and evidence from witnesses and survivors.
Khan declared that Israel has “every right and indeed an obligation to get hostages back, but you must do so by complying with the law.”
In response to the announcement made by Khan, Hamas said in an announcement in a statement that “strongly condemns the attempts of the ICC Prosecutor to equate victims with aggressors by issuing arrest warrants against a number of Palestinian resistance leaders without legal basis.”
“Hamas calls on the ICC Prosecutor to issue arrest warrants against all war criminals among the occupation leaders, 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 stated.
“Nobody can be made above the law’
The accusations against Netanyahu and Gallant include “causing extermination, causing starvation as a method of war, including the denial of humanitarian relief supplies, deliberately targeting civilians in conflict,” Khan said to Amanpour.
“The fact that Hamas fighters need water doesn’t justify denying water from all the civilian population of Gaza,” he said.
Over 35.500 Palestinians were killed, and over 79,000 injured in Gaza since the 7th of October The Ministry of Health in Gaza reported on Monday. CNN is not able to independently verify these figures.
Netanyahu declared the move “a political outrage.”
“They will not deter us and we will continue in the war until the hostages are released and Hamas is destroyed,” he declared at a gathering of the parliamentary section that is part of the Likud party.
Other Israeli officials also echoed his views. Benny Gantz, a member Israel’s war cabinet Khan’s decision right after the announcement and said it was because Israel had been combating “with one of the strictest moral codes in history, while complying with international law and boasting a robust independent judiciary.”
“Drawing parallels between the leaders of a democratic country determined to defend itself from despicable terror to leaders of a blood-thirsty terror organisation is a deep distortion of justice and blatant moral bankruptcy,” said the official, stating that the choice made by the prosecutor “is in itself a crime of historic proportion to be remembered for generation.”
The opposition leader, Yair Lapid, said that the request for warrants for arrest were “a complete moral failure.”
“We cannot accept the outrageous comparison between Netanyahu and Sinwar … We will not remain silent,” he declared.
The Israeli President Isaac Herzog called it “beyond outrageous.”
After reports emerged last month about there was speculation that the ICC principal prosecutor had been contemplating the option, Netanyahu said that any ICC arrest warrants for senior Israeli military and government official “would be an outrage of historic proportions,” and that Israel “has an independent legal system that rigorously investigates all violations of the law.”
Amanpour was asked by Amanpour about the remarks that were made by Netanyahu, Khan said: “Nobody is above the law.”
He also said that in the event Israel is not happy in its stance with ICC, “they are free, notwithstanding their objections to jurisdiction, to raise a challenge before the judges of the court and that’s what I advise them to do.”
Israel as well as Israel and the United States are not members of the ICC. However it is claimed that the ICC declares it to be having the jurisdiction on Gaza, East Jerusalem and the West Bank after Palestinian leaders officially agreed to adhere to its founding rules in the year 2015.
The ICC announcement made on Monday was not related to the ongoing case going through International Court of Justice (ICJ) regarding an assertion of South Africa that Israel was guilty of genocide in its battle against Hamas in the aftermath of the 7th of October attacks.
The ICJ examines cases that involve nations and countries, they also consider cases involving nations and countries, ICC is a court for criminals that hears proceedings against individuals who have committed crime against humanity.
This announcement by the ICC is not the first time the ICC has acted against Israel. On March 20, 2021, the Khan office commenced an investigation into the possibility of crimes committed within the Palestinian territories from July 2014, at Gaza in the Gaza Strip and West Bank.
It is located within The Hague, Netherlands, and constituted through a treaty known as The Rome Statute first brought before the United Nations, the ICC is an independent organization. The majority of countries – 124 them – are members of the treaty, however there are some notable exceptions such as Israel as well as Russia, the US along with Russia.
So, should the court approve Khan’s petition and issues arrest warrants to those five individuals, then any nation that is a member of the group would be required to take them into custody and then extradite the men for extradition to The Hague.
In accordance with the rules of court, all parties to the Rome Statute have the obligation to fully comply with its rulings. This makes it very challenging to Netanyahu as well as Gallant to travel abroad and visit many countries that are Israel’s closest allies. This includes Germany as well as Germany and the United Kingdom.
Sinwar, Haniyeh and al-Masri are officially classified as world terrorists, by the US which means they are subject to the threat of travel bans as well as asset freezes and sanctions. The US as well as and the UK, Japan, Canada and other countries like the European Union and others have identified Hamas as a terrorist group and has imposed sanctions against its leaders.
The story was updated to reflect more developments.
CNN’s Ana Bickford, Claire Calzonetti, Sana Noor Haq, Jeremy Diamond, Benjamin Brown, Michael Schwartz and Tamar Michaelis contributed to this story.
