The International Criminal Court indictments of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant are not isolated incidents. They are part of a much larger extra-judicial campaign by unaccountable ideologues bent on weakening the capability of the world’s strongest democracies to defend themselves.
President Joe Biden has proven far too weak in the face of this threat. President-elect Donald Trump, in conjunction with the Republican majorities in Congress, should move swiftly to put the body in its proper powerless place.
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Created by a United Nations General Assembly conference in 1998, the Rome Statute has since been signed by 139 countries, but not the United States or Israel. From the beginning, multiple U.S. administrations have viewed the ICC as a threat to the ability of the armed services to fully defend the nation. This was confirmed in 2020 when ICC judges authorized ICC prosecutors to open an investigation into the conduct of U.S. servicemembers in Afghanistan. Ultimately, no indictments were made, but the very idea that the ICC might pursue such a prosecution highlights the threat posed by the body.
In the case of Netanyahu and Gallant, Israel stands accused of targeting civilians and intentionally starving the people of Gaza. Both charges are absurd. Israel has every right to defend itself from the existential threat posed to its existence by Hamas, as witnessed by that terrorist organization’s Oct. 7 massacre of Israeli civilians.
Not only have the Israel Defense Forces gone to unprecedented lengths to limit civilian casualties in its war against Hamas, but Israel has expedited the delivery of over 1 million tons of aid into Gaza. Has much of that aid since been stolen by Hamas, who has then used starvation as a weapon against its own people? Absolutely. But it perverts all meaning of the concept of justice to hold Israeli leaders accountable for the actions of Hamas.
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Trump, to his credit, recognized the danger the ICC posed to our national security, and after the ICC began their 2020 investigation into U.S. troops, he sanctioned ICC officials, which turned out to be a big part of the reason an indictment was never brought. Biden, however, is a slave to elite international public opinion and he immediately revoked the sanctions against the ICC Trump has put in place.
As president, one of Trump’s first acts should be to put those same sanctions back in place and even extend them to all those involved in the persecution of Netanyahu and Gallant. Trump should then work with Congress to go even further and act legislatively to delegitimize the ICC. The House already passed the Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act this past June, which would impose visa bans and financial restrictions on key ICC officials. Unfortunately, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has denied that legislation a vote in the Senate, and it is unlikely that Biden would have signed it.
But elections have consequences. There is a new majority leader now, and after Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) re-passes the Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) should swiftly bring it to the floor for a vote so that it can then be signed into law by Trump.
In another world where the International Criminal Court was not populated by far-Left activists who believe that the U.S. is the greatest threat to world stability and prosperity, and not its best protector, an international body capable of delivering justice in countries too chaotic to deliver it themselves might have some merit.
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But we don’t live in that world.
In this world, the ICC has let the warlord Bashar Assad kill over 300,000 civilians and commit hundreds of war crimes without a single investigation. The ICC is not an unbiased seeker of justice; it is a force for disorder employed by a decadent elite. Trump and the Republicans in Congress can’t sanction it out of existence fast enough.