For a decade, Israel's decisions on crucial issues has been influenced by the specter of The Hague - by Ariel Kahana

Despite the echoing failure, at meetings of an inter-ministerial staff this week one could still hear naïve, propitiatory voices. Some suggested waiting to see whether or not the judges at The Hague would agree with the prosecutor, as if any other outcome were possible. Others argued that the US policy of punishing the court – President Donald Trump revoked US visas from its representatives – still hasn't proven effective. Israel has only one option left when it comes to the ICC, which is threatening its most vital self-defense interests. It must move from the language of law to the language of power.

Ariel Kahana..
Israel Hayom..
27 December '19..
Link: https://www.israelhayom.com/2019/12/27/tiptoeing-around-the-icc/

Dr. Alan Baker, who used to serve as legal counsel to the Foreign Ministry, remembers Benjamin Netanyahu's enthusiasm. The year was 2002 – the Second Intifada was wreaking havoc in the streets and the IDF was operating in Arab enclaves in Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza Strip. Netanyahu was at the time foreign minister in Ariel Sharon's government, and Baker was one of a group of Israeli and Jewish legal scholars who were pushing to establish the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

It's no coincidence that Jews were at the forefront of the move to found the ICC. As far back as the 1950s, the idea had been ratting around as a lesson learned from the Holocaust, with the goal being that genocidal murderers would know that they would be held to account. So Israel had already agreed in principle to join the ICC, and all that was necessary was for Netanyahu and the rest of the cabinet to sign off. Netanyahu read the papers and listened to Baker, but as a former ambassador to the UN, he knew firsthand how inherently biased international institutions were. He was concerned that an international entity founded for the highest of purposes would turn against Israel.

Seeing what was to come, and with the US exerting its influence, Netanyahu decided on an about-face in policy, and declared that Israel would not join the ICC. Looking back, that was a wise decision. As bad as the current situation with The Hague is, it would have been much worse if Israel were a member.

Nothing in the outward appearance of the ICC, where I visited a few years ago, indicates that it is a court. Unlike the glorious old palace that housed the International Court of Justice (ICJ), also located in The Hague, the ICC moved to a high-rise office building without any special outward markings a few years ago. When I visited in 2015, a guide supplied by the court led me through the various floors on my way to meet with Phakiso Mochochoko, head of the complementary legal division and one of chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda's deputies.

"I don't know about Israel's experience [with international institutions], but I can say that there are currently processes underway in the court. The charter's laws and principles are the only thing that guides us," Mochochoko told me.

"The processes are clear, fair, and independent," he said.

Mochochoko went on to tell me that "Even if the prosecutor were a friend of Palestinian leaders, she could not pursue a case because they are her friends. That's not how it works. There are judges."

It seems he knew more than I did about a friendship between the prosecutor and the Palestinians.

Israel Does Not Commit War Crimes. Period. - JPost Editorial

Israel needs to say categorically that enabling Jews to live in the West Bank is not a war crime.

JPost Editorial..
22 December '19..
Link: https://www.jpost.com/Opinion/War-crimes-611794

Israel does not commit war crimes.

That is the message Israel needs to send the world, in light of the recommendation on Friday by the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, to investigate Israel regarding alleged war crimes stemming from 2014’s Operation Protective Edge in Gaza; settlement activity since then; and the IDF’s response to weekly riots along the Gaza border fence.

Israel does have soldiers who have committed crimes while in action – as do all countries involved in active military campaigns. And when this happens, the country’s military and civil courts deal with the cases and hold those involved responsible.

Bensouda, in what seems like little more than a fig leaf, wrote that there is also a “reasonable basis” to believe that Hamas and “Palestinian armed groups” committed war crimes. As if there is any doubt that the indiscriminate firing of thousands of rockets on Sderot, Ashkelon and communities nearby – or purposefully setting alight thousands of dunams of agricultural land and forests – is anything but a war crime.

But it is obscene for Bensouda to place Israel and terrorist organizations on equal footing. Unlike Hamas – and what Bensouda called in sanitized language “Palestinian armed groups” – Israel does not intentionally harm civilians in Gaza or anywhere else.

Yes, civilians are harmed in Gaza by IDF actions, but they are not the target.

In 2015, a blue ribbon panel of former top military leaders and generals from eight democratic countries wrote a report after conducting an investigation into Operation Protective Edge. Their conclusion: Israel’s conduct in the conflict “met and in some respects exceeded the highest standards we set for our own nations’ militaries... The IDF not only met its obligations under the Law of Armed Conflict, but often exceeded these on the battlefield at significant tactical cost.”

Furthermore, Israel needs to say categorically that enabling Jews to live in the West Bank is not a war crime.

Jews living at the site of the biblical Shiloh, or in the shadow of the Western Wall and the Temple Mount, are not committing war crimes. One can argue the political wisdom of their living there, and one can say that making peace with the Palestinians is more difficult because they live there, but to say that a Jew living in Judea – the cradle of Jewish civilization – is a war criminal, is ridiculous.