The withdrawal of the previous government’s decision to challenge the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to issue an arrest warrant for the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahuannounced the new British Labour government.
The warrant
In more detail, the ICC prosecutor Karim Khan In May, he sought arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallad for crimes including “deliberate starvation of civilians,” “intentional killing” and “extermination and/or assassination” during Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip. ICC prosecutors have sought similar warrants for senior Hamas figures Yahya Sinwar, Mohammed al-Masri and Ismail Haniya.
Israel’s reaction
The ICC move has angered Israel and its closest ally, the United States. US President Joe Biden has said that “there can be no equation between Israel and Hamas.”
In an interview with the Sunday Times in late May, the prosecutor denied that the Court equates the two sides.
“Israel has every right to protect its people and recover hostages,” Khan said. “But no one has the right to commit war crimes or crimes against humanity.”
Britain’s attitude
Britain, a member state of the ICC, has asked the Court to be allowed to submit legal observations on whether the ICC has jurisdiction over Israelis to take legal action “in cases where Palestine cannot exercise criminal jurisdiction over Israeli citizens (based on) the Oslo Accords”.
However, a spokesman for the centre-left Labour Party and Prime Minister Keir Starmer has since told reporters that the new government will withdraw the legal measure “in line with our long-standing position that this is a matter for the Court to decide”.
The spokesman stressed the importance attached by the new Labour government, which emerged from the July 4 election, to the separation of powers and the rule of law.
“This was a decision by the previous government that was not put forward before the election, which I can confirm the government will not accept, in line with our long-standing position that it is for the judiciary to decide,” a Downing Street spokeswoman said.
“The government will respect international law”
Last week, Prime Minister Keir Starmer told European leaders that your government will respect international law.
The ICC, which deals with war crimes and crimes against humanity, has been investigating both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict since 2021.
That year, the ICC ruled that it had jurisdiction, as the Palestinian Authority had applied to become a member of the Court in 2015, after becoming a United Nations observer state.
AMP Source