The ICC indictments are a great thing
We know Netanyahu is a war criminal. Now it’s time to prove it.
During his recent address to the US Congress, protestors rightly decried Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a “war criminal”. They are correct—in pursuing the ongoing genocide in Gaza, Netanyahu has clearly committed war crimes and crimes against humanity. That’s why it is crucial that we support Netanyahu’s indictment by the International Criminal Court (ICC) and put pressure on the US government to do the same.
In May, the chief prosecutor of the ICC announced that he would seek a warrant for the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as well as the leaders of Hamas. Last week, the UK’s new Labor government dropped plans to challenge these warrants, removing one impediment to a successful ICC indictment of Netanyahu for war crimes and crimes against humanity. US Leftists should call on the Biden administration to follow the UK’s example and rescind its objection to the indictments.
The ICC indictments are extremely important, and they should be supported by the left for at least four reasons. First, and most importantly, they put increased pressure on Israel to stop committing genocide. Second, they point the way toward a post-Atlanticist world where no country—not even the United States or its “special” friends—is above international law. Third, they neutralize Israel’s absurd claims that its genocidal actions in Gaza qualify as legitimate self-defense. And fourth, they can help us move people still exclusively fixated on the victims of October 7 to see the larger picture, creating a vehicle for neutral fact-finding about what really happened, both on October 7 and since. Let’s explore these four points more.
First, an ICC indictment against Netanyahu would provide another point of leverage to compel Israel to cease its genocidal attack on Gaza. There has never been an ICC indictment against an active elected official of the US or one of its allies. This shows the enormous gravity of the crimes of Israel, and the clarity with which the international community sees them for what they are. As an unprecedented step, it puts even greater pressure on Israel to cease the genocide. This pressure is not only diplomatic, but increasingly economic, as investing in a country whose head of state has an ICC warrant out for them certainly poses an added risk. Just this week, the UK’s largest pension fund made significant divestments from Israeli assets.
Second, an indictment against a major US ally would be a key step towards a more just international order—one where no one nation or club of nations is above any other in the application of criminal, economic or political law, and no nation's sovereignty is conditional upon its bending to the will of another. The formal equality of nations within an international system of justice mirrors the formal equality of citizens within a democratic nation-state, and has been the dream of socialists and honest liberals alike for a long time. The minimal condition for such a modest system of basic fairness is an international legal mechanism to hold accountable the military and political leaders of states which commit crimes against humanity, war crimes, and other heinous acts.
Today, the framework and legal mechanism to create this system exist in the International Criminal Court and the UN’s International Court of Justice (ICJ). In the past, the ICC has faced accusations of serving as a tool of Western imperialism, punishing leaders from states of the Global South while giving the leaders of whiter, wealthier nations a free pass. These accusations have merit, but we should not dismiss the ICC’s earnest mandate or conclude its checkered history precludes it ever serving as a genuinely fair international tribunal. Fairness requires a higher body greater than any nation to which all nation states are held accountable. Holding Israel, a US ally, accountable for its crimes is a vital step towards universalizing the promise and premise of the court as a tribunal of genuinely international justice— a vital stepping stone into a world beyond US global dominance.
Third, ICC indictments of both Israeli and Hamas leaders will take the wind out of the sails of the powerful red herring that Israel’s genocidal actions in Gaza qualify as legitimate self-defense. Israel’s claims of self-defense are fraught with Islamophobia, white supremacy and settler colonialism, but are nonetheless compelling for many who haven’t bothered to examine the dark underside of their emotional conviction. Elevating an independant force that is capable of holding both Hamas and Israel to account for their wrongs can help neutralize the rhetorical and emotional power of such appeals. Neutral fact finding and the notion that no one should be above the law is a familiar and accessible concept that can be applied to the international community in general and Israel and Hamas in particular. It’s not Israel’s place to hold Hamas accountable for war crimes, it’s the place of the ICC and ICJ. An independent investigation can shine the spotlight on Israeli vigilantism, in both Gaza and the West Bank. Equality before the law on matters of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity should be bedrock principles of the left.
Finally, an ICC-led investigation will cut through competing narratives to determine what actually occurred on October 7 and subsequently. There is already overwhelming evidence that Israel is guilty of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity: the death toll, the tactics, the civilian targets. But while the sheer scale of this genocidal assault far exceeds the Israeli loss of life on October 7, some remain so stubbornly fixated on Hamas’ initial attacks that they can’t see the broader picture. An impartial investigation of both Israel and Hamas will cut through these concerns and counteract misinformation that has been widely circulated. Whether intentional fabrications or accidental miscalculations, the distance between what happened and what’s been reported is significant, and many questions remain. The number of Israeli civilians killed on October 7th, for instance, has been revised down from 1,400 to 1,200, to 850. The United States, Israel and Hamas are not qualified to determine what exactly has and has not happened. We need a neutral, third-party investigation to learn the truth.
We must celebrate and uphold the ICC and ICJ. We must support the criminal indictments by the ICC against Israel, but also against Hamas, in the interest of finding out what really happened on October 7, and, if necessary, holding its leaders accountable to the standards of international law. No one is above the law, not in the world that we want to live in, and Israel must be held accountable for genocide.
Jeffrey L has done bothersome and occasionally disruptive labor, community and political organizing in the South and on the East Coast. He also sometimes writes.
Well said.