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| ICC Prosecutor, Karim Khan (JTA) |
The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill that would sanction officials of the International Criminal Court or anyone who supports its effort to prosecute Israeli leaders for war crimes.
The Republican-led bill passed with the support of 45 Democrats. It comes after the ICC, based in the Hague, Netherlands, issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister, Yoav Gallant, as well as Hamas leaders, on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
The United States had condemned the charges, and an earlier version of the bill passed the House last year but did not advance further. Thursday’s bill is expected to be brought to the Senate floor, where Republicans have a majority.
The bill freezes the property of, and denies U.S. visas to, anyone who helps t.he court in its effort “to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute” a citizen of the United States or any ally who is not a signatory to the court. Neither Israel nor the United States are signatories.
I don’t think this bill will have any problem being passed
by the Senate.
I kinda feel sorry for all you Netanyahu haters out there. I know how much you want to get rid of him... how much you think he has harmed Israel’s relationship with the US. But that just isn’t the case. The American electorate through the vast majority of their representatives in congress feel otherwise. It appears so too does the Israeli electorate. Polls show Netanyahu’s popularity rebounding.
This should put to rest the machinations of Canada’s highly unpopular Prime Minster, Justin Trudeau. He has promised to arrest Netanyahu if he ever sets foot in Canada again. I don’t think he is going to make good on that promise. I doubt he wants Canada to suffer any of the sanctions the bill provides if he does.
But that may be moot point anyway since Trudeau has lost the confidence of his own party and Canadian voters. He will soon resign as prime minister as well as Liberal Party head. The next prime minster will hopefully have a little more common sense about the credibility of the ICC as an objective court. Which is zero.
As such the ICC should be completely defunded. Their thinly disguised antisemitism is evident and should be acknowledged by the entire world. Those nations that recognize the indictments and issuance of warrants against any of Israel’s leaders testifies to the deep seated antisemitism that is in the genes of those foreign leaders. And speaks to the deliberate ignorance of reality by the ICC upon which they base their case.
Thankfully the majority of US leadership on both sides of the political aisle understand that reality. Which is why they condemned the ICC’s decisions here and why the House passed a bill (soon to be passed by the Senate) that will sanction anyone implementing those ICC directives.
To the chagrin of the ‘blame Israel for everything’ knee jerk progressives whose misplaced empathy has led them astray, they must think the worst thing that can happen is if Trump makes good on his promise. I don’t know what he means when he threatens Hamas with ‘hell to pay’ if the hostages are not released by the time he takes office in a few days. But I can't wait to find out. Hell is where Hamas belongs.
But it will not surprise me that whatever that ends up being - that the ICC will indict him and issue arrest warrants against him, too. To the cheers of all the Trump haters, no doubt.
But that’s OK. Trump is used to being indicted.
