Gaza destruction
Writer Ali Albunimah explains, “When your land has been occupied by a foreign army as long as your children have been alive, and this occupying army regularly brutalises and humiliates the friends and relatives of these children, stopping kids from confronting the invaders is naturally going to be very difficult. Convincing the Israeli adults in control of this weaponry in civilian areas that they should not be using it to kill children who are merely stone throwers should not be difficult. The statistics sadly tell a different story, of a deep-rooted Israeli contempt for the lives of Palestinian children that should inspire Western outrage.”The International Criminal Court (ICC) in the Hague, Netherlands, is trying to do something to address the decades of injustice at the hands of the Israel Occupation, but in response, Israeli diplomats are actively lobbying member states of the ICC to “cut funding for the tribunal” in response to the court’s inquiry into numerous war crimes and human rights abuses by Israel in the Palestinian territories.
Not surprisingly, Israel’s bolshy leader Benjamin Netanyahu was expecting a free pass because of the Charlie Hebdo operation carried out in Paris, but unfortunately, the prosecutor did not get the memo.
Netanyahu threw the predictable tantrum, claiming that this past summer’s slaughter of nearly 2,500 Palestinians was in retaliation for ‘Hamas rockets’ which only killed 3 Israeli civilians. He rants, “It is scandalous that just a few days after terrorists slaughtered Jews in France, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court opens a probe against the state of Israel because we protected our citizens against Hamas…”
(AP) The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court launched a preliminary probe Friday that could clear the way for a full-scale investigation into possible war crimes in Palestinian territories — plunging the court into the most politically charged conflict it has ever tackled.
Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda said in a statement she will conduct the preliminary examination with “full independence and impartiality.”
Potential cases Bensouda could take on include allegations of war crimes by Israel during last summer’s Gaza war where the Palestinians suffered heavy civilian casualties. Israel’s settlement construction on occupied Palestinian lands could also be examined.
The cases could also include alleged war crimes by Hamas, which controls Gaza, including the firing of thousands of rockets at Israeli residential areas from crowded neighborhoods.
The prosecutor’s announcement comes after the Palestinian Authority acceded to The Hague-based court’s founding treaty and recognized its jurisdiction dating back to July, the eve of the last Gaza war. That move opened the door to an ICC investigation that could target possible crimes by both Israel, which is not a member of the court, and Palestinians.
A preliminary examination is not an investigation, but weighs information about possible crimes and jurisdiction issues to establish whether a full investigation is merited.
Palestinian Foreign Minister Riad Malki welcomed the move and said the Palestinian Authority would cooperate.
“The Palestinian people called upon us to go to court and ask for an investigation and therefore we consider the announcement today as a historic event,” he said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu slammed the decision and its timing.
“It is scandalous that just a few days after terrorists slaughtered Jews in France, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court opens a probe against the state of Israel because we protected our citizens against Hamas, a terror organization that is in a covenant with the Palestinian Authority, and whose war criminals fired thousands of rockets at civilians in Israel,” Netanyahu said. “Unfortunately it turns the International Criminal Court into part of the problem and not part of the solution.”
Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman criticized the probe as stemming “entirely from political and anti-Israel considerations” and said he would recommend not cooperating…
Continue this story at New York Times
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