Thread by @4noura

Some thoughts on the #ICC request for arrest warrants.
Firstly,the request reflects its political challenges:It could not remain silent on a live-streamed genocide & as evidenced by the US, Israeli reactions, it also risked its relevance. The request threads this terrain #Thread

The ICC is incapable of delivering justice. And while its request for arrest warrants in the Situation of Palestine bears out this cynical argument, it did set a significant precedent.

#Gaza #Nakba #Genocide #ICC

By its very structure, the ICC is a depoliticizing forum. Its emphasis on criminal culpability limits its reach to individuals at the expense of state crimes, ideologies, & political context.

twailr.com/we-charge-apar…

The #RomeStatute does not include colonialism as a core crime & limits the temporal jurisdictional to the time of a state ratification of the treaty among other limitations that effectively reify European supremacy in the international system.

justsecurity.org/71614/negotiat…

The warrants for Hamas leaders were predictable & expected. See my 2015 essay: "Hamas's] leadership will be the primary target of an ICC investigation... Hamas recognizes this risk and has endorsed the ICC bid [in 2014]"

jadaliyya.com/Details/31657

It is therefore not surprising that the Court requested warrants for more Hamas leaders (3), than Israeli ones (2) and charged Hamas leaders with more crimes (8) than it did the Israeli ones (7).

#ICC #Gaza

Almost absurdly, the Court charges Hamas with sexual violence and mistreatment of hostages while remaining silent on the well-documented sexual violence and other forms of torture inflicted on Palestinians in Israeli captivity.

newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/t…

More, the charges are limited to acts committed on, and since, October 7, 2023, even though the ICC initiated its investigation in 2021 and Palestinian human rights organizations have been filing applications for the past nine years.

Their applications have included crimes committed during the Gaza March of Return, military offensives in 2014 and 2021, a 17-year siege, as well as the crime of settlement expansion in the West Bank.



#Gaza #ICC #Genocidemailchi.mp/85c20e71e57f/n…

Most notably, the Court does not charge Israel with genocide, despite an overwhelming repertoire of genocidal intent, nor of apartheid, the racial edifice upon which genocide has been committed.

ejiltalk.org/apartheid-as-a…

The request for arrest warrants is nonetheless welcome for finally breaking the taboo on charging Israel and challenging the paradigm that has perversely collapsed Jewish safety with Israeli state crimes.

#ICC #Gaza #Genocide

The charges against Hamas are not only expected but less consequential because it is effectively already punished through economic sanctions & diplomatic marginalization by several Western governments. The same cannot be said for Israel.

Israel has benefited from a global legal exception best exemplified by US-afforded impunity within the UN Security Council & the ICC request provides a mechanism to incrementally break through that formidable wall of impunity.

Although the warrants, on their own, will not bring justice, they have cracked the wall that has shielded Israel from accountability and obscured the crisis of the Palestinian right to life and dignity.

The efficacy of the #ICC request, like of the ICJ provisional measures, as well as other legal tactics relies on the political acumen of states, individuals, etc.
A solid place to start is to exact assurances from states that they will arrest Netanyahu & Gallant on their soil.