EDITORIAL – Le Monde
By simultaneously requesting arrest warrants for Hamas and Israeli officials on Monday, May 20, for the massacres of Israeli civilians on October 7, 2023, and the ensuing murderous war that devastated Gaza, Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) Karim Khan was surely expecting to unleash criticism. He was not disappointed.
While both parties are facing charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity, the majority of these protests have focused on what some considered a dishonorable equivalence by the ICC between the crimes committed by an organization that rules by fear in Gaza and is listed as a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union and the actions taken by a democratically-elected government to defend itself.
However disturbing this comparison may be, the response promptly initiated by countries opposed to the ICC since its laborious establishment in 1998 – starting with the US, which is threatening to impose sanctions – is unconvincing. The prosecutor’s approach, as he has explained, was to point out that “international law and the laws of armed conflict apply to all.” He said: “This is how we will prove, tangibly, that the lives of all human beings have equal value.”
While there can be little doubt about the scale of the war crimes committed by the Hamas militia, it is equally clear that the Israeli army’s response, irrespective of the democratic nature of the Israeli government, has failed to meet the standards that guarantee humanitarian law as far as possible in the heat of war. The Israeli political leaders in question, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, have never made a secret of their intentions for Gaza. At issue are the obstacles put in the way by Israeli leaders to the delivery of much-needed food aid to the people of Gaza, more than seven months after the start of military operations.
Commendable initiative
The charge of legal incompetence that has also been leveled against the ICC does not stand up to scrutiny either. Israel is indeed not a member of this jurisdiction, unlike the State of Palestine, which joined in 2015. There is no burgeoning judicial system in Gaza before which Hamas would have to answer for its actions. Leaving aside the Israeli prime minister’s attempted power grab against the Israeli Supreme Court before October 7, 2023, the Israeli army has long enjoyed well-documented impunity for its operations in the Palestinian territories conquered militarily in 1967. Israel is paying the price today. By lending its support to the ICC on Tuesday, France emphasized the need to combat this impunity.
It is now up to a panel of judges to decide what action to take on Khan’s request. In the meantime, while waiting for their response, this first step can already be praised. It is regrettable that the Israeli authorities’ first instinct was to call on their allies to silence the ICC, notably by depriving it of funding. An allegory of impartiality, the blindfold that appears on representations of justice is not to be confused with a muzzle.