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The International Criminal Court’s (ICC) issue of arrest warrants involving the only democratic state in the Middle East, Israel, is a reprehensible, illegitimate move with which member states should not cooperate.

It is false moral equivalence to issue arrest warrants for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel’s former defence minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas terrorist Mohammed Deif, believed dead.

We believe Australia should withdraw its membership from the ICC, which lacks credibility because it has accepted false accusations and not followed due process, ignored its own rules of complementarity, has not given Israel the right of reply, cancelled a trip to Israel to discuss the case, and does not have jurisdiction in this matter. The ICC has jurisdiction only over member states; Israel is not a member, and Gaza is not a state.

Israel, while defending itself against promises of many repeats of October 7, has achieved the lowest ratio of civilian-to-combatant deaths in the history of urban warfare.

Absurd

The Wall Street Journal editorial, as reported in The Weekend Australian on 23-24 November 24, said,

“The charge of deliberate starvation is absurd. Israel has facilitated the transfer of more than 57,000 aid trucks and 11 million tonnes of aid even though Hamas’ rampant theft means Israel is provisioning its battlefield enemy, something the law doesn’t require.”

This ICC decision is antisemitism, victimisation of the Jewish state, and the first time the leader of a democratic state has been issued an arrest warrant for defending his state against terrorism which is still continuing. This will have consequences for other democratic states defending themselves against terrorism and could even detrimentally affect Australia.

By supporting the ICC’s move, Australia would have to arrest PM Netanyahu if he visited, and it is saying it believes PM Netanyahu is a war criminal. Australia is supporting the weaponisation of international legal organisations.

Immoral

Australia has no moral compass when it comes to Israel. It has continually criticised Israel and not terror groups like Hamas and Hezbollah and tolerates outrageous statements by Imans and Iran’s ambassador to Australia.

The chief prosecutor of the ICC, Karim Khan KC, is facing sexual misconduct allegations and, as a lawyer, has represented people accused of war crimes like the son of Gaddafi, who is wanted by the ICC for war crimes, and Charles Taylor, former president of Liberia, who was convicted of 11 counts of war crimes in 2012. He lacks personal credibility and has relied on a biased panel of terror supporters to advise him.

Australia is funding the ICC and needs to use better moral judgement as to how we use our funding, not to mention funding UNRWA to the tune of millions even after the UN itself admitted UNRWA staff’s involvement in the October 7 massacre of Israel’s civilians.

What we have here is a kangaroo court which adds fuel to the fire of antisemitism in Australia and risks making Australia a laughingstock.

We have even denied a visa to former Israel justice minister Ayelet Shaked, who was due to attend a conference here, in case she vilifies a segment of the Australian community or incites discord. What about all the discord that has been incited on Australian streets and universities etc., since October 7 that has been allowed to run rampant? Not only that, but our government is also funding organisations that promote this discord under the guise of social cohesion. What a joke!

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Republished with thanks to Indigenous Friends of Israel. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.