In condemning the decision of Karim Khan, the top prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) for seeking arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, his Defence Minister, the USA is playing a dangerous game. Its reluctance to acknowledge war crimes impartially whether committed by a friend or foe undermines its credibility when championing human rights and damages its already tarnished reputation on the international stage.
Senator Jim Risch, the US top Republican Senator on the Senate Foreign Relation’s Committee, described prosecutor Khan’s decision as “absurd.” He went on to say "today’s actions (by the the ICC) have hurt the credibility of the court and seriously harmed legitimate accountability efforts where true war crimes are occurring, like Ukraine, Syria and across Africa." Contrary to this Senator’s view I think that most would agree that the credibility of the ICC would indeed have been “hurt” and seriously undermined if the ICC had failed to seek an arrest warrant for Netanyahu and Gallant.
Equally if not more concerning is the apparent double standards that are at play here. When President Putin was issued with an arrest warrant for actions in the Ukraine war both the USA and the UK fell over backwards to rain praise on the ICC’s decision. The then British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly stated “we welcome the step taken by the independent ICC to hold those at the top of the Russian regime, including Vladimir Putin, to account. Work must continue to investigate the atrocities committed." President Joe Biden described the Putin arrest decision as “justified” and further stated “He's (Putin) clearly committed war crimes."
All the above politicians were keen to support the ICC’s independence. Yet the ICC is now being condemned exactly because of its independent and impartial decision. It shouldn’t be forgotten that Khan is also seeking arrest warrants for senior members of Hamas but I am not expecting to hear condemnatory statements and threats from US Senators regarding this ICC decision any time soon. Such selective condemnation is so blatant as to be outrageous.
So where does this leave us? Not in a good place. Such politicisation of war crimes and manipulation of justice undermines the efforts of an unaligned and peaceful country like Oman to bring about peaceful solutions. By turning a blind eye to war crimes owing to your country’s strategic interests you create distrust among warring parties who become reluctant to sit opposite each other at a negotiating table.
Israel’s blockade of Gaza and the cruel nature of its bombing campaign – more civilians have died in Gaza in a month than have died over the whole of the Ukraine war – has infuriated the Muslim world, leading to increasing diplomatic isolation for both the Israeli and American governments.
The US influence in the Middle East and around the world has been greatly reduced owing to its unconditional support for Israel. It’s refusal to give even lip service to the maintenance of international law when it concerns Israel and its refusal to listen to the understandable condemnation of the genocide taking place in Palestine by even friendly nations, demonstrates a lack of judgement.
Pax-Americana and the US Empire are in decline and, as Britain learned to its cost, the failure of an Empire to heed warnings and the inability or unwillingness to acknowledge the winds of change taking place globally will only hasten this decline.
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