Accused war criminal status will be hard stigma for Netanyahu to shrug off
Accused war criminal status will be hard stigma for Netanyahu to shrug off
The ICC warrants are a legal earthquake and could weigh heavier on the Israeli PM and his former minister over time
Other felons probably won't mind.
They sure won’t, and they’re the only ones that can stop him.
Neither the US nor Israel ratified the Rome Statute, so they are not held accountable by the ICC.
Most of the EU is part of it though so if they stick to it they'd have to arrest him if he enters their countries. Although I already saw France was calling it "a complex case" and saying that they weren't sure whether they'd actually arrest him if he visited...
this assumes he gives a shit
He might consider it a badge of honor instead.
Yeah because criminals being proud of their crimes totally isn’t a thing. Especially when the law isn’t ever enforced.
George W. Bush comes to mind.
Maybe he and Bibi can paint cute pictures together while Michelle Obama gives them candy
He wasn't charged with any crimes by the ICC.
And yet I'm sure he'll do his best. Authoritarians are like that.
lol no. if commiting genocide doesn't bother you, then people calling you names won't either.
he might even brag about it
The thing that's tougher to shrug off is that he now has a rotating list of countries where depending on who's in power he cannot visit without being arrested.
Why? Literally every other head of state war criminal shrugs it off.
There's a big difference between meeting the criteria for being a war criminal and having an arrest warrant issued by the ICC.
he will be long dead while israel still enjoys all the land hes stolen for them.
Accused? Isn't he officially a war criminal now?
I think that would require conviction.
That should be an accused, convicted crimminal
Ummm I don't think he cares even a little
Now do Biden
It's hard to shrug something off if you aren't at all trying to shrug something off.
I know many will see this as a futile gesture but I’ll try to put out some reasonings that it’s may not be all that futile. The warrant may not do what it sets out to do, which is to put Netanyahu and Gallant in trial and prosecuted, but it will serve itself in other indirect ways.
It can be political ammunition in diplomatic talks. Nations in support of the Palestinians, many of which are small, can use this to gain some leverage against countries that give no shits about the ICC like the US, however little that is (though given we’re going to have Trump back in the WH, it’s basically pointless). It’s also useful as another ammo for them to back out of unfavorable deals, citing national opinion on the genocide in Gaza.
Of course, this potentially benefits the ICC as well, though it can certainly go very wrong. Western nations may very well rally behind Israel and pull support off the ICC, further crippling it. So this is hopefully a well-calculated move from the ICC after reading the tea leaves. It can benefit the ICC internationally as it has always been criticized to be pro-Western, and this may help to ease some of their reputation with non-Western nations.
In a world where cooperation and trust between nations is slowly crumbling, and I may just be trying to be optimistic here because hell knows if that cooperation was ever really a thing, this gesture, however overt, isn’t something we shouldn’t welcome.
It doesnt matter if the ICC gains from it politically or not. Justice can only be served if equal rules are respected by everyone or at least most of the involved. Now it will be put to test, if nations like Germany, France or the UK actually care for a rules based international order, or if it was just a sham to get what they wanted. If the masks fall, at least it gives the other nations a clear fighting ground, knowing that there is no point in abiding by any rules with the countries rallying behind the war criminals instead of rallying behind the law.
I can see it being a political calculus for the ICC to garner as much support as possible, and not just from their traditional supporters. The stigma that it’s merely a tool, using justice in selective ways to further Western interest, strongly dissuades many 3rd world countries from seeing it as a force of true justice. If the ICC truly seeks to have justice delivered, they cannot rely on just nations like Germany, France, or the UK for support, and they will be strongly crippled if, say, more than half the countries in the world no longer see it as legitimate. So this could be an attempt at sending a message to all nations of what it’s setting out to do, which is good, since even if, like you said, the masks fall off Western nations, there is an entity that can provide other nations with grounds to enact justice for themselves against these forces.
As long as US protects him, there is literally zero practical consequences for this shit stain
I am sure he will suffer through.
You can have a pretty good life as a former war criminal.
Just like General Butt Naked. A warlord who met the Devil and then God.
Pretty sure it's going to be as hard for him to shrug off as a backpack with a quick release on the straps that activates by shrugging.
Maybe if he had chosen a much more chill defence minister...
(Just a bad joke about the similar faces of David Carradine and Gallant.)