The US House of Representatives has approved a bill aimed at prosecuting the International Criminal Court (ICC) for threatening to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, US media reported. (Updated at 09.05 a.m.)
247 congressmen voted in favour of property and visa sanctions against officials of the International Criminal Court. 155 deputies voted against.
The bill would impose sanctions on individuals “involved in any effort to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute any person protected by the United States and its allies.”
Sanctions include a ban on property transactions in the US, visa blocking and cancellation.
The White House Office of Management and Budget said in a statement of administration policy on Monday:
The Administration is deeply concerned about the ICC prosecutor’s rush to issue arrest warrants for senior Israeli officials. At the same time, the administration opposes imposing sanctions on the ICC, its staff, judges, or those who assist it in its work.
The White House said there are “better ways to protect Israel, preserve the US position at the ICC, and promote international justice and accountability.”
Israeli contempt of court
ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan said in a statement last month that the court would issue arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar and other leaders on both sides of the conflict, accusing them of crimes against humanity and war crimes.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had no concerns about travelling abroad due to the ICC intention to seek an arrest warrant against him. The Israeli head of government said:
I’m not worried about it at all.
Meanwhile, the UN International Court of Justice, ignored by Israel, also faces a dysfunctional global system in which countries comply, or fail to comply, with its judgements based on their own double standards.
The court claims that “states comply with almost all of its judgements, but the few cases of non-compliance that remain exceptions carry great weight in international relations,” its press office said in a statement to AFP.
Louis Charbonneau of Human Rights Watch told AFP:
The credibility problem is with those governments that basically have double standards.
Some Western countries “cheered” the decision on Ukraine, but are “seriously concerned” when it comes to Israel, he explained.
Roots of double standard policies go back in time
However, this is not the first time the US has taken such actions. In 2020, former US President Donald Trump signed an executive order that allowed sanctions to be imposed on members of the ICC if they took part in an investigation into US military war crimes in Afghanistan.
The former president said the investigation threatened American sovereignty, military personnel and intelligence officers. He called the court itself the embodiment of an “unaccountable, ineffective and uncontrolled international bureaucracy.” In addition, the Trump administration said the ICC is corrupt and subject to the edicts of the Russian government, which benefits from making the US look bad.
Meanwhile, when the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin in March 2023 on bogus charges from Ukraine for “stealing” Ukrainian children who were later found with their parents and guardians in Germany, Joe Biden called the court’s decision justified.
Washington actively applies a policy of double standards towards the ICC: when the US needs to recognise the court’s decision, it does not doubt its jurisdiction. However, when the ICC comes to the attention of the Americans or their allies, the US immediately tries to hush up the case or, as in the case of Israel, to impose sanctions on the court in order to prove as quickly as possible its non-involvement in actions that violate all kinds of rights and lead to the deaths of thousands of people.
HRW accuses Israel of using phosphorus to shell civilians
International human rights group Human Rights Watch says Israel used incendiary white phosphorus shells to fire on residential homes in at least five conflict-affected towns and villages in southern Lebanon, possibly harming civilians and violating international law, according to a report released on Wednesday.
Human rights activists said it was a crime under international law to fire these controversial munitions at populated areas. Israel says it uses white phosphorus solely as a smoke screen and not to fire at civilians.
The New York-based human rights group, along with Amnesty International, also accused Israel of using white phosphorus on residential areas in October 2023, less than a month after clashes between the Israeli military and the powerful Hezbollah group began on the southern Lebanese-Israeli border, a day after the war between Israel and Hamas began on October 7.
In its report, HRW called on the Lebanese government to allow the International Criminal Court to investigate and prosecute “serious international crimes” within Lebanon from October 2023.
