Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has decided against stopping over in Europe prior to his coming address to the US Congress over concerns regarding his arrest warrant application with the International Criminal Court (ICC), Israeli media reports. The ICC’s chief prosecutor is seeking warrants to put Netanyahu, along with Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, on trial for war crimes committed in the besieged Gaza Strip.
On Wednesday, Israel’s Reshet Bet radio station explained that the Israeli leader was considering a layover in a friendly European country, as there were discussions about the feasibility of his plane, the “Wing of Zion,” making the direct flight. Hungary and the Czech Republic were reportedly suggested as possible layover options en route to the US, however, Netanyahu is said to be against any pauses in the trip, fearing a potential arrest.
Although the US has railed against the warrant applications and threatened retaliation, even staunch European supporters of Israel’s war effort against the Palestinians living in the bombed-out coastal enclave, such as Berlin, have conceded they will arrest the prime minister if a warrant is issued. Likewise, there is anticipation that London’s new Labor government will drop its legal bid to prevent the court from issuing the arrest warrants. Therefore, the report says the prime minister’s plane will carry only about 60 people, with the remainder of his delegation taking separate flights.
As Middle East Eye elaborates, “Israel is not a member of the ICC. However, the state of Palestine was granted membership in 2015. The court can, therefore, investigate Israeli individuals for crimes committed in occupied Palestine, including Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Although the US is not a member of the court, the UK, France and several of Israel’s western allies are ICC members,” and thus are obligated under the Rome Statute to follow through with Netanyahu’s arrest.
In addition to his Congressional address, the Israeli leader overseeing a war which the World Court has deemed a “plausible” genocide, will meet with President Joe Biden in person for the first time since last October. Polls show that at least half of Americans who voted for Biden during the last election believe Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinians. The White House has already furnished Tel Aviv with over $6.5 billion in weapons for Netanyahu’s war, transferred tens of thousands of bombs, including 14,000 one-tonne bombs alone. From the early days of the war, these 2,000 pound munitions were routinely dropped in the areas falsely described by the Israeli apartheid army as “safe zones.”
This week, a group of United Nations experts declared, “Israel’s intentional and targeted starvation campaign against the Palestinian people is a form of genocidal violence and has resulted in famine across all of Gaza.”
The Israeli onslaught has slaughtered nearly 40,000 Palestinians, including mostly women and children, left approximately 10,000 more trapped under rubble or presumed dead, destroyed over half the buildings across the entire Strip, decimated the health infrastructure, and laid waste to agricultural land and facilities amidst a strangulation blockade prohibiting the entry of food and other vital aid.
The Lancet, a UK-based medical journal, published an article that estimates even if a permanent ceasefire, which Netanyahu is emphatically opposed to, was implemented immediately, more than 186,000 Palestinians in Gaza would still be killed due to his merciless campaign’s direct violence and indirect effects.
Gallant and Netanyahu face war crimes and crimes against humanity charges including using starvation of civilians in the Strip as a method of war, willful killing, extermination, and collective punishment. The chief prosecutor is also seeking warrants for three Hamas officials.
