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Orde F. Kittrie

@ordefk

Nov 21

Thread: Comments on ICC warrants by former US State Department attorney Orde Kittrie: There is no factual or legal basis for these warrants against top Israeli officials. The warrants are clearly driven by politics and the same anti-Israel animus that has long dominated the United Nations and other international organizations. These filings should be treated as what they are: quintessential lawfare, a political vendetta masquerading as a legal proceeding. 1/5

The ICC warrants indicate a clear double standard. The ICC has not issued arrest warrants for the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei or any other Iranian official, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad or any other Syrian official, or the genocidal Chinese President Xi Jinping or any other Chinese official. While the Islamic Republic of Iran, Syria, and the People’s Republic of China are, like Israel, not ICC members, the ICC has only concocted a specious jurisdiction claim for Israel, a democratic nation with a robust and independent judiciary. This is an outrageous abuse of power. 2/5

There is bipartisan opposition to the ICC’s illegitimate overreach. In fact, since the ICC’s founding in 2002, every U.S. administration, of both parties, has refused to join the court, fearing the ICC’s politicization and misuse. Both the Biden and Trump administrations and over 330 Members of Congress from both parties have rejected ICC investigations of the U.S. and Israel in the past, and both administrations have chosen not to join the ICC. NSC Spokesperson John Kirby said on April 30, “We don’t believe the ICC has any jurisdiction here.” 3/5

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Orde F. Kittrie

@ordefk

May 20

Thread by me, a former US State Department attorney and author of a book on lawfare, regarding today's outrageous ICC filing of arrest warrants for Israeli PM Netanyahu and Defense Min. Gallant: There is no factual or legal basis for these warrant filings against top Israeli officials. The filings are clearly driven by politics, and the same anti-Israel animus that has long dominated the United Nations and other international organizations. These filings should be treated as what they are: quintessential lawfare, a political vendetta masquerading as a legal proceeding. 1/11

The only serving national leaders for which the ICC has previously issued such arrest warrants are Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi, Russia’s Vladimir Putin, and Sudan’s Omar al-Bashir. Israel’s leaders do not belong in such company. 2/11

The ICC has never issued arrest warrants for: Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei or any other Iranian official, Syrian President Bashar al Assad or any other Syrian official, or the genocidal General Secretary of the People’s Republic of China, Xi Jinping, or any other Chinese official. 3/11

Read 10 tweets

Orde F. Kittrie

@ordefk

Jan 26

Thread: Analysis of today's ICJ order by Orde Kittrie (law professor, senior fellow, and former US State Dept. attorney):
ICJ order's negative impact on US national security: “The ICJ’s failure to entirely dismiss South Africa’s meritless claims undermines the West’s on-going fight against the many authoritarian and terrorist leaders who are willing to drive up their own sides’ casualties by using their own civilians as human shields. The court ignored that Gaza civilian casualties are massively inflated by Hamas' rampant use of Palestinian civilians as human shields. But the court used those inflated civilian casualty figures, for which Hamas is responsible, to justify measures against Israel. In doing so, the ICJ incentivized the use of human shields by authoritarian enemies such as China and Russia, and by terrorist enemies such as ISIS and the Taliban, who like Hamas are happy to sacrifice their own civilians if it will help them to undermine Western militaries by falsely accusing them of war crimes.” 1/9

Former State Dept attorney Orde Kittrie on inaccuracy of using term “genocide” to describe Israel’s actions in Gaza: “South Africa failed to provide any substantive evidence (because there is none) that Israel is either committing or intending to commit genocide. Indeed, Israel's advance warnings and other steps to mitigate harm to Gaza civilians make clear Israel's goal is not genocide but, far from it, to minimize Palestinian civilian casualties while lawfully exercising Israel's rights to free the hostages, apprehend October 7 atrocity perpetrators, and protect Israel's population from further attacks.” 2/9

Former State Dept attorney Orde Kittrie on content of the ICJ provisional measures package: “The provisional measures package appears to reflect a kind of compromise in which the Western judges secured agreement from the Chinese, Russian and other non-Western judges to not issue a binding ceasefire order but in exchange agreed to both support lesser binding orders and include in the non-binding preamble numerous quotes from UN officials severely (and in my view unfairly) castigating Israel. As a result, the Court, in its reasoning and what it did order, lent far too much credence to South Africa’s false accusations.” 3/9

Read 9 tweets

Orde F. Kittrie

@ordefk

Mar 7, 2022

🧵As part of new Iran deal, US to reportedly lift all sanctions on many of Iran’s most barbaric abusers of human rights, including Khamenei, Raisi, Rezaei, Deghhan. This thread gives five reasons why that is a very bad idea and describes each of their abuses of human rights. 1/

Lifting sanctions on Iran's worst human rights abusers sends a dangerous message of impunity to Putin and his henchmen at a time when they are committing war crimes in Ukraine and human rights abuses in Russia. 2/

Lifting sanctions on Iranian human rights abusers abandons reformers, other dissidents in Iran. There were mass uprisings in Iran in 2018, 2019, 2020. Regime killed 1500 demonstrators in Nov 2019 alone. US should support the victims not free the perpetrators from consequences. 3/

Read 15 tweets

Orde F. Kittrie

@ordefk

Mar 5, 2022

🧵As war rages in Europe, US & Russia must carefully avoid getting close to the nuclear brink. The stakes are too high. Even in less tense periods, technical & other errors have several times nearly led to nuclear war between the US and Russia/USSR. 1/ ucsusa.org/resources/clos…

For example, on January 25, 1995 the launch of a Norwegian scientific rocket was misunderstood by Russian military as a US nuclear attack (Norway's letter notifying of the launch got lost in Russia's bureaucracy). Then-President Boris Yeltsin activated his "nuclear football." 2/

Yeltsin was told he had only 8 minutes to launch Russian missiles before the "US nuclear missile" could reach Russia and leave Russia defenseless. But US-Russia relations were relatively good and a sudden US attack must have seemed unfathomable. 3/ washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/inatl/l…

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Orde F. Kittrie

@ordefk

Jul 14, 2021

Thread -- The Israel Defense Forces announced today its discovery that Hezbollah is storing rockets, military-grade explosives and other weapons in a home 25 meters from a children's school in Lebanon. 1/ jpost.com/middle-east/id…

By using the civilian students of the school and civilian residents of the home as human shields for its weapons, Hezbollah is engaging in a war crime, in violation of the Geneva Conventions and customary international law. fdd.org/2020/10/15/tim… 2/

A law passed by Congress unanimously in December 2018, the Sanctioning the Use of Civilians as Defenseless Shields Act (“Shields Act”), requires the U.S. president to impose sanctions on Hamas and Hezbollah persons involved in the use of human shields. fdd.org/2020/10/15/tim… 3/

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