HOW DOES ANY PERSON WITH A CONSCIENCE DEFEND ISRAEL'S GENOCIDE?
Lawless: Washington Celebrates ICC ruling against Russia, Condemns Warrant Request for Israel Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Karim A.A. Khan, Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), said Monday that he is asking the the ICC to issue arrest warrants for several Hamas leaders as well as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Secretary of Defense Yoav Gallant. It is the first time the ICC has sought […] |
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Karim A.A. Khan, Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), said Monday that he is asking the ICC to issue arrest warrants for several Hamas leaders as well as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Secretary of Defense Yoav Gallant. It is the first time the ICC has sought warrants against leaders of a parliamentary government. Most of the officials indicted have been from African dictatorial regimes. If the warrants are approved, in a process that may take several months, Netanyahu and Gallant will join a rogues gallery featuring deposed Libyan strongman Moammar Gaddafi, deposed Sudanese dictator Omar al-Bashir, and Russian President Vladimir Putin. In March, 2023, just a year ago, Secretary of State Antony Blinken asked all countries that are parties to the ICC to detain Vladimir Putin if they could, after the court issued an arrest warrant for him. Russia is not a signatory to the Rome Statute that authorizes the court, but in 2015 Ukraine (also not a signatory) granted jurisdiction to the court over Ukrainian territory. It was for crimes committed in Ukraine that Putin was indicted. The reaction in Washington to the warrant request for Netanyahu and Gallant has been the opposite. This reaction shows that the Biden administration does not respect international law and does not care that Putin committed crimes under it, but just wants to stick it to Putin. It is personalistic, not a matter of law. Because if the law was at issue, it should apply to everyone, including (especially) Benjamin Netanyahu, the Butcher of Gaza. Everything Washington officials said in response to the request for warrants was wrong. I mean, incorrect. It isn’t a matter of opinion or a difference in values. They are spewing falsehoods. It is as though they have all contracted Trumpitis and now keep compulsively telling serial lies. President Biden, apparently now the chief defense attorney for Netanyahu, denounced any “equivalence” between Hamas and the Israeli leadership and said that he rejects charges of genocide against it. Biden’s spokespeople questioned whether the ICC has jurisdiction to charge the Israeli leaders. Secretary of State Antony Blinken condemned the announcement as “outrageous” and said that it threatened the success of negotiations toward a ceasefire and a hostage release. Mr. Blinken did not explain why the ICC request for warrants should should delay a ceasefire. The Biden administration vetoed 3 ceasefire calls at the UN Security Council earlier this year, and abstained on a fourth, which it undercut by falsely damning it as “non-binding.” Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike Johnson said he and his colleagues would look into the possibility of placing sanctions on the ICC judges and their families. The 18 judges are elected to nine-year terms by an assembly of the 124 states that are signatories to the Rome Statute, finalized in 2002, which authorizes the court and lays out International Humanitarian Law. The ICC therefore represents nearly two thirds of the countries in the world. Mike Johnson represents a district in Louisiana. The parties to the International Criminal Court include Britain, Canada, France, Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Ireland, Switzerland, Japan, Spain, Sweden, as well as the State of Palestine and large numbers of countries in Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Pacific. It took some courage to sign the Rome Statute, since the officials of the signatory country place themselves under the authority of the judges. It is not a courage that the United States, Israel or Russia displayed, and it is disgraceful that the United States has not signed the major human rights instrument of the twenty-first century. Al Jazeera English Video: “World reacts to ICC prosecutor seeking Israel, Hamas arrest warrants” So why is everything Washington is saying about the decision of Karim Khan wrong? First, the request for warrants does not make an equivalence between Israel and Hamas. The court does not judge countries, it judges individual officials. These are the charges against the three Hamas leaders, aside from just killing a lot of innocents:
Rape and other acts of sexual violence as crimes against humanity, contrary to article 7(1)(g), and also as war crimes pursuant to article 8(2)(e)(vi) in the context of captivity; Torture as a crime against humanity, contrary to article 7(1)(f), and also as a war crime, contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i), in the context of captivity; Other inhumane acts as a crime against humanity, contrary to article 7(l)(k), in the context of captivity; Cruel treatment as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i), in the context of captivity; and Outrages upon personal dignity as a war crime, contrary to article 8(2)(c)(ii), in the context of captivity. Rape, torture, hostage taking all bulk large here. These are the charges against Netanyahu and Gallant:
Wilfully causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or health contrary to article 8(2)(a)(iii), or cruel treatment as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i); Wilful killing contrary to article 8(2)(a)(i), or Murder as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i); Intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population as a war crime contrary to articles 8(2)(b)(i), or 8(2)(e)(i); Extermination and/or murder contrary to articles 7(1)(b) and 7(1)(a), including in the context of deaths caused by starvation, as a crime against humanity; Persecution as a crime against humanity contrary to article 7(1)(h); Other inhumane acts as crimes against humanity contrary to article 7(1)(k). The charges aren’t the same, or equivalent, at all. The Israeli officials are charged with starving the civilian population, blowing up the civilian population, exterminating the civilian population. There is no mention of rape or torture or hostage taking. In each case the officials are being charged for their specific actions. The Israeli officials are not charged with genocide by the ICC, contrary to what Mr. Biden alleged. The reason that the ICC has jurisdiction is that the State of Palestine has very doggedly and brilliantly arranged for that jurisdiction. First, Palestine sought to be admitted as a non-member observer state of the United Nations, the same status that the Vatican has. The UN General Assembly voted Palestine in some 12 years ago. As an observer state, it gained the right to become a signatory to the Rome Statute, which it did in 2015. Then Palestine asked the ICC to exercise jurisdiction over the Occupied Palestinian Territories, which had de jure been granted to the State of Palestine by the 1993 Oslo Peace Treaty, signed by Bill Clinton, Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat. On February 5, 2021, the ICC concluded that it does have jurisdiction over actions taken in the Occupied Territories. Gaza is included in that jurisdiction. Hence, the ICC can issue the request for warrants against Hamas war criminals as well as against Israeli officials who commit war crimes or crimes against humanity in the Occupied Territories. It most definitely has jurisdiction. In fact, since Palestine is a party to the ICC, the case for jurisdiction here is much stronger than for Ukraine and Putin. Prime Minister Netanyahu has repeatedly rejected the whole notion of a ceasefire and contrary to Mr. Blinken’s flagrant toadying there is no prospect of any such ceasefire. Hamas offered a hostage deal on the eve of the invasion of Rafah, and Netanyahu invaded precisely in order to torpedo any deal. That is why Israelis are demonstrating in the tens of thousands against Netanyahu. If Blinken had any shame he’d fly to Tel Aviv and join them. The ICC decision is completely irrelevant to negotiations, which have in any case collapsed and are not ongoing. Blinken is trying to blame Karim Khan for his own egregious failure as a diplomat. Unlike Khan, Blinken has done nothing practical to hold Netanyahu to account for repeatedly violating the Biden administration’s toothless red lines. As for Mike Johnson and his merry band of GOP troglodytes, he should be careful if he’d ever like to vacation in Rio or in most of Europe. Article 70 of the Rome Statute has these paragraphs prohibiting:
(e) Retaliating against an official of the Court on account of duties performed by that or another official; The Court should play hardball with politicians who try to sanction its judges, and should issue warrants against them. Wouldn’t it be lovely to see Mike Johnson arrested while on vacation at the Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro and unceremoniously flown to the Hague in handcuffs? And Mike Pompeo and Trump, who did sanction ICC judges, should also have warrants out. Though with Trump the ICC would have to get in line behind a whole gaggle of prosecutors waving warrants for an endless list of crimes. Amal Clooney backs ICC call for Arrest Warrant for Netanyahu  ( Middle East Monitor ) – Amal Clooney, wife of Hollywood actor George Clooney, and renowned human rights lawyer provided an “expert report” supporting the ICC’s arrest warrant application for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his Defence Minister Yoav Gallant and three senior Hamas officials, she said in a statement. Published on the Clooney Foundation […] |
( Middle East Monitor ) – Amal Clooney, wife of Hollywood actor George Clooney, and renowned human rights lawyer provided an “expert report” supporting the ICC’s arrest warrant application for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his Defence Minister Yoav Gallant and three senior Hamas officials, she said in a statement. Published on the Clooney Foundation for Justice’s website, the statement said that Clooney joined a panel of international legal experts to evaluate evidence of suspected war crimes and crimes against humanity in Israel and Gaza. She wrote, ““More than four months ago, the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court asked me to assist him with evaluating evidence of suspected war crimes and crimes against humanity in Israel and Gaza. I agreed and joined a panel of international legal experts to undertake this task. Together we have engaged in an extensive process of evidence review and legal analysis including at the International Criminal Court in The Hague.” “The Panel and its academic advisers are experts in international law, including international humanitarian law and international criminal law,” she explained. “Despite our diverse personal backgrounds, our legal findings are unanimous. We have unanimously determined that the Court has jurisdiction over crimes committed in Palestine and by Palestinian nationals.” “We unanimously conclude that there are reasonable grounds to believe that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant have committed war crimes and crimes against humanity including starvation as a method of warfare, murder, persecution and extermination,” she continued. Explaining her reason for agreeing to take on this role when she was approached by the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court Karim Khan four months ago, Clooney explained: “As a human rights lawyer, I will never accept that one child’s life has less value than another’s. I do not accept that any conflict should be beyond the reach of the law, nor that any perpetrator should be above the law.” “I hope that justice will prevail in a region that has already suffered too much.” Clooney, who is of Lebanese origins, has faced months of criticism of failing to speak out against Israel’s genocidal bombing campaign in Gaza which has killed more than 35,500 Palestinians to date.  This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. A further paragraph from Ms. Clooney’s letter has been quoted.What could President Raisi’s Death mean for Stability in Iran and the Mideast?  By Scott Lucas, University College Dublin | – A helicopter carrying Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi, the country’s foreign minister and other officials crashed in the mountainous north-west reaches of Iran on Sunday May 19, sparking a rescue operation in thick fog and driving rain. On Monday, search and rescue teams reached the crash site and […] |
A helicopter carrying Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi, the country’s foreign minister and other officials crashed in the mountainous north-west reaches of Iran on Sunday May 19, sparking a rescue operation in thick fog and driving rain. On Monday, search and rescue teams reached the crash site and “found no signs of the helicopter’s occupants being alive”.
The death of Raisi and his foreign minister will shake up Iranian politics. Who was Raisi? What happens now? And what could his death mean for stability in the country and beyond? We spoke with Scott Lucas, a Middle East scholar at University College Dublin, who has been writing about tensions in the Middle East for many years.
Who was Ebrahim Raisi?
Raisi was a dedicated servant of Iran’s former supreme leader (the country’s highest authority), Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Rising through the judicial system in the 1980s, Raisi came to prominence as a member of the “death committee” imposing capital punishment on thousands of detainees in 1988 at the end of the Iran’s war with Iraq.
The exact number of those who were sentenced to death is not known. But human rights groups have estimated conservatively that about 5,000 men and women were executed in what has been described as a crime against humanity. Raisi denied his role in the death sentences, but also said they were justified because of a religious ruling by Khomeini.
He has also served as deputy chief of justice, attorney general and then a chief of justice. He crafted an image as a leader that was tough on corruption while also working to purge opponents of the regime. In 2016, he was also appointed by the supreme leader to oversee the Astan Quds Razavi religious foundation, which controls tens of billions of US dollars.
In June 2021, Raisi was installed as president in Iran’s elections, handing the elected leadership back to the hardliners. The result came as no great surprise. Raisi was seen as the candidate of the current supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and the clerical establishment moved to promote his election and impede challengers.
How big of a blow is losing Raisi for the regime?
Raisi was considered loyal to Khamenei and often took on the role of a scapegoat to help the supreme leader avoid criticism. It is because of this loyalty that, despite being seen as unexceptional and even weak by many in Iran’s political system, Raisi had been mentioned as a possible successor to the supreme leader.
But, in itself, the loss of Raisi has little effect on the Iranian system. He was largely a placeholder representing the wishes of the supreme leader, the Revolutionary Guard Corps and hardliners.
The bigger challenge is replacing Raisi with a minimum of in-fighting in the Iranian regime, maintaining the ostracism of reformists and centrists, and suppressing any protests.
Following the crash, Khamenei reassured Iranians there would be “no disruption to the work of the country”. How true is this claim?
The supreme leader’s statement is best understood as a call to Iranians to avoid “disruption”, given the series of nationwide protests that erupted after the contested result of Iran’s 2009 presidential election.
The incumbent president at the time, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was declared the outright winner against many people’s expectations. Widespread unrest followed and thousands of people were arbitrarily arrested, and dozens were killed on the streets or died in detention.
Channel 4 News Video: “Iran president Ebrahim Raisi dead in helicopter crash”
Khamenei’s rhetoric is also an “all is well” proclamation defying the serious economic problems and regional tensions that Iran faces. Iran’s economy has been in a parlous state for years, through a combination of mismanagement and sanctions. The currency is at a historic low, having lost 93% of value since 2018. Inflation remains above 40% officially and far higher unofficially. And unemployment is high, especially among the younger generation.
The regime continues to suppress protests through detentions and intimidation. But demands for reforms are still widespread. They have been galvanised by the regime’s crackdown over compulsory hijab. Iran’s authorities have tried to quash centrists as well as reformists, but face a backlash from public criticism, including that of former president, Hassan Rouhani.
Who will replace Raisi?
If a president dies in office, Iran’s constitution says that the first vice president takes over for a period of 50 days, with the approval of the supreme leader. A new presidential election is then held at the end of the interim period. Khamenei has confirmed that the first vice president, Mohammad Mokhber, will serve as the country’s acting president until elections are held.
The process will be an accelerated version of the standard procedure, with a 12-member guardian council vetting all candidates and disqualifying those deemed not acceptable. That should ensure a contest between a hardliner and a conservative, blocking any high-profile centrist or reformist.
Different factions within government will be manoeuvring for the supreme leader’s favour. Raisi’s occupancy has signalled the ascendancy of hardliners throughout the regime, pushing aside conservatives. However, there is no clear hardline favourite at this point.
Meanwhile, parliament speaker and former presidential candidate, Mohammad Qalibaf, may be the most likely conservative. He has been at the forefront of Iranian politics for 25 years. But he has also failed in two presidential campaigns, and is unacceptable to many hardliners.
What could Raisi’s death mean for stability in the Middle East and beyond?
The regime will want to avoid any further turmoil in the regime while it rearranges the desk chairs of power. This includes the replacement of foreign minister, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, who had played an important role in trying to present Tehran’s case to the world and finding ways to ease the impact of western sanctions.
The open question is whether Israel, embroiled in its war in Gaza and serious domestic tension around Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, will return to attacks on Iranian interests, such as its targeted assassinations of Tehran’s commanders in Syria and Hezbollah officials in Lebanon.
Scott Lucas, Professor of International Politics, Clinton Institute, University College Dublin
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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