Another ICC warrant for the same reasons targets Mohammed Deif, head of the armed wing of Hamas, whose bloody attack on October 7, 2023 on Israeli soil was followed by a military offensive in the ravaged Gaza Strip by massive bombings ever since.
“Anti-Semitic” decision. “No scandalous anti-Israeli decision will prevent us – and especially not me – from continuing to defend our country in any way whatsoever,” assured Benjamin Netanyahu in a message to his fellow citizens Thursday evening. The leader had previously denounced an “anti-Semitic” decision and considered himself the victim of a new “Dreyfus trial”, named after the Jewish French captain convicted of espionage at the end of the 19th century before being exonerated and rehabilitated.
Also described as “scandalous” by Joe Biden, this decision limits the travel of the two Israeli officials. Any of the court's 124 member states would theoretically be obliged to arrest them if they entered their territory, even if dozens of countries including Russia, the United States, and even China do not recognize the jurisdiction of the court. the ICC. The Palestinian Islamist movement welcomed the indictment of Israeli leaders as an “important step towards justice”, without mentioning the arrest warrant announced simultaneously against its military leader.
Famine. The arrest warrants issued by the ICC are “unprecedented, justified and late,” said Reed Brody, a lawyer specializing in war crimes. The ICC said it found “reasonable grounds” to believe that Messrs. Netanyahu and Gallant were “criminally responsible” for the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare, as well as crimes against humanity of murder, persecution and other inhumane acts.
The two men, according to the ICC, “intentionally and knowingly deprived the civilian population of Gaza of things essential to their survival”, including food, water, medicine, fuel and electricity. This situation “created living conditions calculated to bring about the destruction of part of the civilian population of Gaza”, explained the ICC, which however considered that “the elements of the crime against humanity of extermination” were not reunited.
Another warrant was issued for Mohammed Deif, although according to Israel he was killed in a July 13 strike in southern Gaza. Hamas denies his death. “This means that the victims' voices are being heard,” said Yael Vias Gvirsman, who represents the families of 300 Israeli victims of the Hamas attack on October 7.
“No equivalence”. “Whatever the ICC may imply, there is no equivalence, none, between Israel and Hamas,” commented US President Joe Biden. The head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, affirmed that the arrest warrants must be “respected and applied”, even if some member countries of the European Union criticized them, with Hungary denouncing “a shame for the legal system international “.
The Israeli military offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip has left at least 44,056 Palestinians dead, according to figures from the Hamas government's Health Ministry, which do not distinguish between civilians and combatants. It followed the unprecedented attack by Hamas commandos in Israeli territory on October 7, which led to the death of 1,205 people, the majority civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli figures.
Skepticism in Gaza. In Israel, the ICC's announcement caused consternation among residents and a certain skepticism tinged with fatalism among the population in Gaza. “No matter how many arrest warrants they issue, there is no justice in this,” said Moshe Cohen, a resident of Beersheva, in the south of the country. In central Gaza, Hasan Hasan, a displaced Palestinian, says he is convinced that “the decision will not be implemented because no decision in favor of the Palestinian cause has ever been implemented.”
Again on Thursday in the Palestinian territory, Civil Defense announced the death of 22 people killed overnight by an Israeli strike in Gaza City (north). Another nighttime raid in the area of Beit Lahia and Jabalia (north) left dozens dead and missing, according to medical sources.
Israel also launched massive strikes in Lebanon on September 23 against pro-Iranian Hezbollah, which had opened a “support front” for Hamas after October 7, by firing rockets into Israeli territory. Israeli raids on the Bekaa Valley, a Hezbollah stronghold in the east of the country, killed 40 people, the Lebanese Ministry of Health announced on Thursday, as the US president's special envoy, Amos Hochstein, is in Israel, after Beirut, to try to obtain a truce between the belligerents. And in the evening, the ministry announced that 12 people had been killed and 50 others injured in strikes on the south of the country.
Charlotte VAN OUWERKERK
© Agence France-Presse
