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karim khan
War Criminal Netanyahu Deflects With False Charges of Antisemitism
Proclaiming Israel and its conduct above reproach by framing all criticism as antisemitism is mutually harmful to Jews and Palestinians.
Oct 02, 2024
Remember the summer of 2017 in Charlottesville, Virginia. That night in August when white nationalists marched through the campus of the University of Virginia in a rally dubbed Unite the Right carrying torches, with some carrying flags with the Nazi black swastika and some chanting the Nazi slogan “Blood and soil” and, also, “Jews will not replace us.” Manifest antisemitism at its core.
Remember also in October 2018 the mass murder at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh of 11 Jewish worshippers by a lone gunman filled with hatred toward Jews. That was also antisemitism at its core.
Remember also in October 2018 the mass murder at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh of 11 Jewish worshippers by a lone gunman filled with hatred toward Jews. That was also antisemitism at its core.
And centuries before there was when King Edward I ordered the expulsion of all Jews from England in 1290. Then there was the plague in the 14th century, the Black Death, propelling the story that Jews were the culprit by poisoning wells; a story some argue led to the “Medieval Holocaust.” These events are among others through history of Jews being persecuted.
Then there is May of this year when chief prosecutor Karim Khan of the International Criminal Court (ICC) announced he was seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza war. Charges Netanyahu in absolute fashion, and erroneously, characterized as antisemitic in his video statement responding to Khan’s announcement, saying:
Israel is waging a just war against Hamas, a genocidal terrorist organization that perpetrated the worst attack on the Jewish people since the Holocaust... Mr. Khan takes his place among the great antisemites in modern times. He now stands alongside those infamous German judges who donned their robes and upheld laws that denied the Jewish people their most basic rights and enabled the Nazis to perpetrate the worst crime in history.
Quite an accusation in Prime Minister Netanyahu comparing Mr. Khan to enablers of the Holocaust. Quite an accusation given Netanyahu failed to mention Khan was also seeking the arrest of the three principal leaders of Hamas for war crimes and crimes against humanity primarily in the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023.
In interviews in September with BBC’s Nick Robinson and then with Newsweek, prosecutor Karim Khan discussed his actions as a necessary equal application of international law. In his interview with Newsweek, Khan said:
Throughout history, we see that international law has been applied in a haphazard manner. It has not been applied evenly. And we’re seeing simply now vividly the unequal application of the law, particularly because of where we are. The world is connected…that it must be that all life matters equally. And there are certain situations that have developed in which it seems to be that powerful people think it’s a law-free zone, and we have to show that law applies everywhere. It’s not something that you can take it or leave it. It’s not an à la carte menu. You have to accept law in its totality if we’re not going to have a Wild West developing or widening in which you can grab what you want and do what you want to anybody that’s less powerful than you.
Then Mr. Khan added:
And whether they’re the families in the kibbutzim that are mourning the people killed from the seventh of October, or that are so horrendously being kept today… or it’s Palestinians in the West Bank or in Gaza, they have the right, not as a charity, not as a favor to them, but they have a right to be seen by the law.
Now juxtaposition the perspective of equality articulated by Khan in his interview with Newsweek with how Prime Minister Netanyahu ended his speech on September 27 before the United Nations General Assembly. After framing Iran the pivotal enemy in the Middle East, Netanyahu concluded by portraying the U.N. itself as a “swamp of antisemitic bile.” For starters, he said this:
The singling out of the one and only Jewish state continues to be a moral stain on the United Nations. It has made this once-respected institution contemptible in the eyes of decent people everywhere. But for the Palestinians, this U.N. house of darkness is home court. They know that in this swamp of antisemitic bile, there’s an automatic majority willing to demonize the Jewish state for anything. In this anti-Israel flat-Earth society, any false charge, any outlandish allegation can muster a majority.
Then Netanyahu added:
And given the antisemitism at the U.N., it should surprise no one that the prosecutor at the ICC, one of the U.N.’s affiliated organs, is considering issuing arrest warrants against me and Israel’s defense minister, the democratically elected leaders of the democratic state of Israel.
The ICC prosecutor’s rush to judgment… is hard to explain by anything other than pure antisemitism.
Netanyahu’s persistent charge of antisemitism leveled against anyone who criticizes Israel leads to this conclusion: Accusations of antisemitism are just another weapon in Netanyahu’s, if not Israel’s, arsenal.
Netanyahu’s weaponization of accusations of antisemitism is a dangerous double-edged sword. It could weaken the legitimacy of efforts to eliminate demonstrable antisemitism and the bigoted and often violent hatred toward Jewish people. On the other hand, Netanyahu’s weaponization also may legitimate hatred toward Palestinians and toward those, even in the Jewish community, who support equality and self-determination for Palestinians. The latter is Netanyahu’s explicit purpose in his rhetoric; that is, portraying anyone who supports Palestinian equality as antisemitic.
Netanyahu’s weaponization of charges of antisemitism has no relationship to the working definition of antisemitism developed by member states in the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA), the United States and Israel among them. This is the definition used by the U.S. State Department.
The IHRA delineated examples of behavior and activities considered antisemitic encompassed in its definition. Targeting Israel only because it represents a Jewish collectively was one. But as IHRA also states, “criticism of Israel similar to that leveled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic.”
ICC’s chief prosecutor Khan in his aforementioned interviews plainly states seeking the arrest of both Israel and Hamas leaders for war crimes and crimes against humanity represents equity in application of international law.
Then also, remember the international criticism of apartheid in South Africa. Such rings similar to criticisms of the Middle East version of apartheid in Israel. Similar criticism; not antisemitic.
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'We Will Not Arrest Him': UN Ambassador Says US Would Flout ICC Warrant Against Netanyahu
"I think you know the answer," Linda Thomas-Greenfield said in a dismissive response to a question about whether the U.S. would abide by an ICC arrest warrant against the Israeli prime minister.
Sep 13, 2024
The Biden administration's envoy to the United Nations said Thursday that the U.S. would not abide by an International Criminal Court arrest warrant against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
"I think you know the answer to the question about whether we will arrest [Prime Minister] Netanyahu," Linda Thomas-Greenfield said in response to Sarah Leah Whitson of Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN). "He was here in the United States a few weeks ago and he was not arrested."
When Whitson pointed out that ICC judges have not yet approved prosecutor Karim Khan's application for an arrest warrant against Netanyahu, Thomas-Greenfield said: "Okay, well, let me be clear: We will not arrest him."
Watch the exchange:
"Are you going to abide by the ICJ orders? Are you going to arrest Netanyahu... if he turns up in the US?" DAWN's @sarahleah1 asks @USAmbUN at @CFR_org, referencing ICJ opinion on illegality of Israel's occupation and pending ICC Netanyahu arrest warrant. pic.twitter.com/sxkUInyvFp
— DAWN MENA (@DAWNmenaorg) September 12, 2024
Thomas-Greenfield's remarks came days after Khan urged ICC judges to expedite their decision on his May request for arrest warrants against Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas leaders, citing "ongoing criminality" in the Gaza Strip.
Khan said earlier this week that the arrest warrants are needed to "prevent the continuing commission of the crimes alleged," including the starvation of civilians as a method of warfare and "extermination."
The Biden administration has opposed Khan's investigation of war crimes in the Palestinian territories and Israel since it began in 2021, arguing that the ICC does not have jurisdiction there. Israel, like the U.S., is not a party to the Rome Statute, which created the ICC.
Thomas-Greenfield reiterated U.S. opposition to ICC prosecutor's arrest warrant request on Thursday even after a key ally, the United Kingdom, dropped its objections to the proposed warrants against Israeli leaders in the face of Gaza's worsening humanitarian catastrophe. The U.S. has been accused of hypocrisy for opposing the arrest warrant request for Israeli leaders while readily supporting the ICC's arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin over war crimes in Ukraine, even though neither Russia nor Ukraine is a state party to the Rome Statute.
The U.S. envoy also said Thursday that she does "not believe the Palestinians, as they exist right now, have all the elements to give it statehood," a position that makes the U.S. an outlier in the international community.
US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield: "I do not believe the Palestinians as they exist right now have all of the elements to give it statehood."
(In April, the US vetoed a UN Security Council resolution that would’ve made Palestine a full member of the UN) pic.twitter.com/vvsruoo886
— Prem Thakker (@prem_thakker) September 12, 2024
Atrocities continued to mount across the Gaza Strip this week as the U.S.—Israel's leading arms supplier—doubled down on its rejection of efforts to hold Israeli leaders accountable.
Citing medical sources in the Palestinian enclave, Al Jazeerareported Friday that "at least 16 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza since the early hours of this morning."
"This number includes five members of the same family who, according to the Palestinian Civil Defense, were killed in an attack on al-Mawasi in south Gaza this morning," the outlet added. "It said two children were among those killed."
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Amnesty Urges War Crimes Probe of 'Indiscriminate' Israeli Attacks on Gaza Camps
The human rights group said Israeli forces "failed to distinguish between civilians and military objectives by using unguided munitions in an area full of civilians sheltering in tents."
Aug 26, 2024
In an investigation focusing on a pair of Israeli massacres of forcibly displaced Palestinians in Gaza, Amnesty International on Monday urged the International Criminal Court—whose chief prosecutor has already applied for warrants to arrest Israeli and Hamas leaders—to open a war crimes probe of the attacks, which it said were likely "indiscriminate" and "disproportionate."
"On May 26, 2024, two Israeli airstrikes on the Kuwaiti Peace Camp, a makeshift camp for internally displaced people in Tal al-Sultan in west Rafah, killed at least 36 people—including six children—and injured more than 100," noted Amnesty, which early in the assault on Gaza found "damning evidence" of Israeli war crimes including indiscriminate killing of civilians.
The Tal al-Sultan attack, which hit an Israeli-designated "safe zone," ignited an inferno that burned people alive inside the tents in which they were sheltering. One survivor told Amnesty that "there were so many dead people all around us," many of them "in pieces and in pools of blood."
"The military could and should have taken all feasible precautions to avoid, or at least minimize, harm to civilians."
The Amnesty report states that the airstrikes, "which targeted two Hamas commanders staying amid displaced civilians, consisted of two U.S.-made GBU-39 guided bombs" and that "the use of these munitions, which project deadly fragments over a wide area, in a camp housing civilians in overcrowded temporary shelters likely constituted a disproportionate and indiscriminate attack, and should be investigated as a war crime."
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the Tal al-Sultan massacre a "tragic mistake."
"On May 28, in the second incident investigated, the Israeli military fired at least three tank shells at a location in the al-Mawasi area of Rafah, which was designated by the Israeli military as a 'humanitarian zone,'" Amnesty continued. "The strikes killed 23 civilians—including 12 children, seven women, and four men—and injured many more."
"Amnesty International's research found that the apparent targets of the attack were one Hamas and one Islamic Jihad fighter," the publication notes. "This strike, which failed to distinguish between civilians and military objectives by using unguided munitions in an area full of civilians sheltering in tents, likely was indiscriminate and should be investigated as a war crime."
Erika Guevara-Rosas, Amnesty International's senior director for research, advocacy, policy, and campaigns, said in a statement that "while these strikes may have targeted Hamas and Islamic Jihad commanders and fighters, once again displaced Palestinian civilians seeking shelter and safety have paid with their lives."
"The Israeli military would have been fully aware that the use of bombs that project deadly shrapnel across hundreds of meters and unguided tank shells would kill and injure a large number of civilians sheltering in overcrowded settings lacking protection," she added. "The military could and should have taken all feasible precautions to avoid, or at least minimize, harm to civilians."
Israel—whose 325-day bombardment, invasion, and siege of Gaza has left more than 144,000 Palestinians dead, maimed, or missing and millions more suffering forced displacement, starvation, and disease—is currently on trial for genocide at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague, Netherlands.
In January, the ICJ ordered Israel to "take all measures within its power" to uphold its obligations under Article II of the Genocide Convention. Israel's far-right government and military have been accused by human rights groups of ignoring the order.
As Israeli forces launched a major ground invasion of Rafah four months later, the ICJ issued another order for Israel to "immediately halt its military offensive" in the city, where around 1.5 million forcibly displaced and local Palestinian residents were sheltering. Instead of heeding the order, Israel ramped up its assault on Rafah.
At the International Criminal Court, Prosecutor Karim Khan is urging the tribunal to promptly act upon his May application for warrants to arrest Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and three Hamas leaders—at least one of whom, political chief Ismail Haniyeh, was subsequently assassinated by Israel.
Guevara-Rosas on Monday reminded Israel of its legal responsibility to protect noncombatants.
"The avoidable deaths and injuries of civilians is a stark and tragic reminder that, under international humanitarian law, the presence of fighters in the targeted area does not absolve the Israeli military of its obligations to protect civilians," she said.
"All parties to the conflict must take all feasible precautions to protect civilians," Guevara-Rosas added. "This also includes the obligation of Hamas and other armed groups to avoid, to the extent feasible, locating military objectives and fighters in or near densely populated areas."
The new Amnesty report was published on the same day that Human Rights Watch called upon the ICC to investigate alleged and documented incidents of Israeli forces torturing imprisoned Palestinian medical workers, including at the notorious Sde Teiman prison, where guards are accused of war crimes including murder, rape, and torture.
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