It's a PR play ultimately, they can't just say "Netanyahoo is a war criminal, K thx bai". That would call the court's judgement into question for a lot of people. If massacring civilians and aid workers is a war crime, then yeah, he's a war criminal, but they have to also address the elephant in the room, that Hamas is also wantonly committing war crimes and is calling for even more even though they're significantly less powerful in this dynamic.

I don't like this "but Hamas is worse" rethoric. War crimes are ware crimes, you're not allowed to commit them because the other side is worse than you.

This may be how things played out after the second world war, but it's a horrible standard to live by. If the ICC has any integrity, they won't take "but they started it" as an excuse.

>you're not allowed to commit them because the other side is worse than you.

Aren't you? I thought the Geneva convention and similar treaties all require reciprocity.

Under the Geneva conventions, yes, but the Rome statute only copies select passages of the Geneva convention, and I don't believe the "we can commit war crimes as long as you don't promise not to commit war crimes" is part of what's copied.

The Rome Statute does allow foe the ICC to convict according to the Geneva conventions as well, but the exemptions therein don't necessarily apply.

First of all, "In cases not covered by this Protocol or by other international agreements, civilians and combatants remain under the protection and authority of the principles of international law derived from established custom, from the principles of humanity and from the dictates of public conscience." (Article 1, second paragraph, Additional Protocol I.)

Second, both Israel and Palestine have signed the main conventions. Israel with reservations, and have not signed AP I and II. Palestine have signed all of them, unconditionally.

Since both are signatories, they are both bound by the conventions even if the other party breaks them.

It should also be noted that the geneva conventions have passed into customary international law. They apply even to countries that haven't signed them.

> Aren't you? I thought the Geneva convention and similar treaties all require reciprocity.

No, i don't think so.

To quote the fourth geneva convention (fourth convention is the part related to treatment of civilians):

> Although one of the Powers in conflict may not be a party to the present Convention, the Powers who are parties thereto shall remain bound by it in their mutual relations.

So why did it take them 7 months to issue a warrant? It should have been issued on Oct 8.

The fact that it didn't tell you all you need to know about how legitimate this "court" is.

You're not wrong, but the world is imperfect and they're forced into this weird role of being both a political institution and an "international court" which, as constructs go, doesn't make a lot of sense.

Short of going full "one world government" or the next best thing, "team america world police" you can't really violate state sovereignty even if someone is doing atrocities so instead you need to convince key players or a critical mass that something should be done. If successful, you can then tighten the screws on that person as fast as you can get all the relevant bureaucracies moving.

By combing these warrants into a single press release they've completely lost any legitimacy.

There were no "screws needed" to issue an arrest warrant against Hamas months ago. Yet they didn't.

They should have issued arrest warrants years ago against Hamas for deliberately firing into civilian territory. It's an easy case to make, no one at all claims Hamas didn't do that.

But, nope, they did not issue any warrant.

No, they only issued a warrant against Hamas to pretend like they have some balance in trying to issue a warrant against Netanyahu.

It's no longer Netanyahu on trial, it's actually now ICC that is on trial. If the ICC actually grants the warrant against Netanyahu they have proven themselves to be a bunch of clowns with no legitimacy.

We shall see.

Yeah, again, you're not wrong. While I'd maybe call that position a bit idealistic, it is really weird that they didn't go after various people earlier. That said, they don't have their own carrier strike group so they have to generate international cooperation. The US is already kinda iffy on the ICC's existence because they've called out our war criminals before and, for reasons I don't fully understand, that's a problem. The whole thing is very...contrived I guess?

For the same reason they didn't issue a warrant against the Israel government over the past twenty years: the conflict spiraled out of control months ago.

In 2019, the ICC got involved following the 2014 Gaza war and concluded that war crimes were taking place (on both sides, in different ways), but they concluded that they lacked jurisdiction. Investigations has been ongoing ever since.

Absolutely, most people don't think that far though so they're trying to hedge a bit.

A big complication is that on the one hand you have an identifiable army, on the other hand you have something akin to a militia/guerrilla where combatants and non-combatants are hard to ID often because one person can be both. When you have a resistance it get further muddied because like in WWII France, the resistance was civilians. So you can be a civilian and a combatant.

Things like what Milosevic or what Janjaweed leaders do are identifiable.

> does not imply that they think both are the same.

They clearly not the same. One is a modern state and one is not.

The actions of both are not so different. Killing civilians is not good. Whether it be guerilla terrorism or bombs and troops

> Killing civilians is not good.

International law looks at this differently. There's a huge difference between targeting civilians and striking genuine military targets that have civilian human shields, especially after issuing a warning and taking reasonable precautions. The first is a war crime, the second is actually allowed by Geneva conventions. The phrase “killing civilians” throws these differences out of the window and simply shouldn't be used in intelligent conversion about this topic.

> There's a huge difference between targeting civilians and striking genuine military targets that have civilian human shields

Even in the latter case, the cost to civilian lives has to be proportional to the the military value/lives saved long-term by ending the threat. This is not proportional: https://www.972mag.com/lavender-ai-israeli-army-gaza/

But unfortunately, the latter case does not account for all that we've seen in the last few months and years. There's been plenty of "targeting civilians" too

As far as i understand, Israel disputes much of this (not that civilians have died, but that it has been non porpotional). ICC is innocent until proven guilty, so its going to take more evidence than anonoymous leaks to get a guilty verdict.

Additionally they werent charged on the basis of unporportionality afaik, i think all the charges are based around failing to let in enough food aid, causing a famine.

> i think all the charges are based around failing to let in enough food aid, causing a famine

No, starvation is only one of the alleged offences: "the use of starvation as a method of warfare, together with other attacks and collective punishment against the civilian population of Gaza"

https://www.icc-cpi.int/news/statement-icc-prosecutor-karim-...

I guess we'll have to wait and see what the case is when it gets to trial. The legal report https://www.icc-cpi.int/sites/default/files/2024-05/240520-p... makes it sound like the primary thing is alleged use of starvation, with other attacks being in the context of that (with the caveat that other charges are still under investigation):

> The Prosecutor seeks arrest warrants against Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister of Israel, and Yoav Gallant, the Israeli Minister of Defense, on the basis that they committed the war crime of ‘intentionally using starvation of civilians as a method of warfare’ under article 8(2)(b)(xxv) of the ICC Statute. The Prosecutor also seeks to charge the two suspects with various other war crimes and crimes against humanity associated with the use of starvation of civilians as a method of warfare under articles 7 and 8 of the ICC Statute

Really?

I think that is a distinction without a difference

If your siblings are killed or maimed in their home or at a party, do you care?

Killing people is a bad thing

Then you disagree with international law and common sense. If my siblings are killed with a rocket that targeted a hospital turned a weapon silo, I would blame those who put the weapons there, not those who launched the rocket.

Obviously Hamas are responsible for the hospital becoming a target.

But there is version of this where weapons at the hospital are removed by force, without bombing it.

Yeah, but it's a magical version in an imaginary realm.

Protecting a few key humanitarian sites from bombing doesn't seem impossible if there was a will to do so.

Maybe you can explain how you envision that working.

The Israeli army would use their miliary assets on the ground. They invaded and established a temporary occupying force to deal with Hamas, so resources other than air are available.

The air force can hit the targets required around the hospital to allow an easier time for ground forces. Reach the hospital, and use those ground forces to secure it.

They already use ground assets. Your plan needs more detail. When the IDF ground forces enter a hospital hallway where Hamas terrorists have positioned hostages in front of them and behind them, what should the IDF do? N.B.: the terrorists are shooting at them.

You mean like this?

https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/15/middleeast/idf-accidentally-k...

What do you imagine that demonstrates aside from that it is possible for mistakes to occur? Especially when you're fighting an enemy for whom it is an advantage for you to kill its own population for the propaganda value.

It shows that it doesn't matter where the hostages are because they'll just shoot at everyone anyways

I hope you think enough of yourself to realize that that reasoning is not worthy of you.

And what makes you think the IDF is so discerning in their targets? They attacked the USS Liberty with the intention of killing everyone aboard knowing it was a US vessel and they've been continuously killing tens of thousands of women and children, they also purposely target and kill journalists

OK. You're just spewing bullshit. Thanks.

Links to all of the sources, mostly US government docs, about the Liberty

https://docs.google.com/document/u/0/d/1D9Zaet2ypKD7H6gyxYtU...

One source of many about targeting journalists for over two decades

https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/09/middleeast/israel-military-jo...

One source on IDF killing indiscriminately

https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2024/02/middleeast/israel-bo...

And for some extra flavor have a few sources on the IDF posting videos of their abuse of Palestinians

https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-11-09/ty-article-ma...

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/idf-posting-abuse-foota...

Are these actions that of the "most moral army"?

These things are easily googlable yet you haven't bothered to do the slightest bit of reading before dismissing the claims outright. Even the US president had said that the attack on the Liberty was 100% intentional while knowing it was a US vessel

I'm not dismissing the "claims" because they aren't true. I'm dismissing them because even if they are, it is specious to think that they are relevant to the values represented by Israel vs. Hamas. Hamas is a death cult explicitly documenting its objectives and actions. Israel shares Western values. Obsessive documentation isn't required to compare Israeli society and its aspirations with the hellhole that Hamas has constructed for the Gazans it oppresses.

I didn't realize that western values included apartheid regimes oppressing people. The examples show that this has been going on for a lot longer than Hamas has existed and that Israel is always the aggressor

Are you fine with Israel knowingly and purposefully attacking and killing US naval officers?

First you said I was spewing bullshit which implies falsehoods, but now the things I claim are true but they're just fine? That's nuts

You say they share western values, does that include freedom of the press? Do we kill journalists purposefully in the western world? Which values, precisely, are you referring to? Because I don't see them

Unless you mean to say that they aren't Muslim, which is what I see from a lot of the Zionist crowd

Not to mention, it isn't about the values of Hamas but the value of the lives of the Palestinian peoples. Israel has been oppressing and killing them for decades

You're an intrepid researcher. Watch some of the videos of the Arabs in Gaza cheering the Hamas atrocities. It's not just Hamas. You don't see a difference in values?

Also learn something about the history of the region and not just from the students parroting what they've seen on Tik Tok.

History such as how we needed Israel as opposition to other countries that would potentially align with the USSR? The USSR that no longer exists?

Here's a video based on US government documentation about the liberty and some of the history of Israeli lobbyists going back to the 1960s

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CfABflKvFzk

On the topic of people cheering on death and slaughter, how about Israelis?

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/20/israelis-cheer...

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/israeli-crowds-chant-raci...

Is that the kind of value that you align with? People cheering on the oppression and slaughter within an apartheid state funded by your and my tax dollars

https://www.btselem.org/apartheid

We can wax poetic all we want about history but we need to live in the present and not fund ethnic cleansing

> But there is version of this where weapons at the hospital are removed by force, without bombing it.

Version A (what happens now): Israel calls everybody in the vicinity of the hospital, gives them time to evacuate. Then Israel strikes the hospital with a missile without a warhead. Then Israel actually bombs it.

Version B (what you suggest): IDF storms in with guns blazing.

What version, in your opinion, will result in more civilian deaths?

Two things:

1. In many cases whole Gazen families have bee killed in their homes.

2. I always blame those giving orders. On both sides.

Does anybody look at it like that though? If a sibling of yours was accidentally killed in a car accident would you consider that to be the equivalent as somebody deliberately running down your sibling? While the end result is the same the intent is different.

Maybe you could argue Israel is not accidentally doing this, but collateral damage of civilians will almost always happen regardless of how careful attacks are planned. I don't think there has ever been a war that occurred in such a densely packed area that has had no civilian causalities.

> Maybe you could argue Israel is not accidentally doing this,

I think there is an element in glee at civilian casualties on both sides

International law thinks there is a significant difference between different types of death in war, and that is the basis of these proceedings.

You can personally think international law is wrong, but that probably won't affect what the ICC does very much.

> Killing people is a bad thing

There are videos of them celebrating on Oct 7 and crowds attacking the hostages when they're brought into Gaza.

Did they think killing is a bad thing?

> Did they think killing is a bad thing?

I do not know, but not on the face of it

But we can all do better than justify our actions on the basis of "they did it too"

That is school yard logic, and nation states can do better

Silly me, tho. The nation states involved all seem to be devoid of principals

Context and nuance are very important. Are the allied forces of WWII all mass murderers?

Or to put it more broadly what distinguishes a soldier who has killed dozens of enemy soldiers from a school shooter who killed dozens of his peers?

According to your statement they are morally equivalent, society at large would vehemently disagree with you.

> especially after issuing a warning and taking reasonable precautions

Ahh, yes, like when the IDF told Gazan civilians by evacuation order to move to the south of Gaza because they were going to intensify bombing in the north.

And then increased bombing of southern Gaza by 85% in the next 10 days...

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/gaza-war-satellite-data-shows-isr...

It does mean that in the realm of logic.

But media, PR and politics don’t play by these rules. Mention two things together and the messages will go through.

A similar example would be Whataboutism, a logical fallacy, but it seems to work very well in politics.

While I understand your point about the optics of it, optics should play no role in determining whether somebody is guilty of war crimes. When optics are a primary factor, war crime laws are a tool the powerful use to punish the weak.

I have my issues with the ICC, but they are supposed to enforce international law impartially.

It took them 7 MONTHS! To issue an arrest warrant for some blatantly obvious crimes.

Issues warrants for both sides at the same time is utterly repugnant and calls the entire court into question.