Israel-Hamas war: arrest warrants requested against Netanyahu and members of Hamas

The Israeli Prime Minister and members of Hamas are the subject of a request for an arrest warrant. against them by the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC). A panel of ICC judges must now confirm them, or not.

The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), Karim Khan, has requested in a press release published this Monday, May 20, arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant as well as against several Hamas leaders , for war crimes and crimes against humanity. The alleged facts would have been confirmed. committed within the Gaza Strip. The crimes accused of the Israeli head of government and his Minister of Defense relate, among other things, to crimes such as “starving and starving people”. release of civilians, "extermination and/or murder" or "intentional homicide". Now, a panel of ICC judges must approve, or not, these arrest warrants, reports CNN.

In order to justify the establishment of these arrest warrants, the International Criminal Court specifies in its press release: that several "éelements of evidence collected and examined" allow responsibility to be borne of war crimes and crimes against humanity, committed on the Palestinian territory "à from October 8, 2023 at least, &with Benyamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant.

A systemic attack against civilians

As bombings continue on the Gaza Strip since the terrorist attack carried out by Hamas against Israel on October 7, Karim Khan said: that the civilian populations are the subject of a “continuation of a generalized and systemic attack in the pursuit of an organization's policy. Questioned on April 30th as for   a possible arrest warrant issued à against him, Benjamin Netanyahu had estimated "that no decision, whether from The Hague or elsewhere, will in any way prejudice the our determination to achieve all the objectives of the war, reports BFMTV.

In addition to the arrest warrants against members of the Israeli government, others have also been arrested. nbsp;été requested à against Yahya Sinouar, Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri and Ismail Haniyeh, respectively head of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, head of the armed wing of Hamas and head of the political branch of the movement. They are notably accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Israel and the Gaza Strip. In addition, accusations of "murder", "hostage-taking", "extermination", "torture" or even "rape and other forms of sexual violence" are worn é against them. "My office observes that there are reasonable grounds to believe that their responsibility for Criminal prosecution is being initiated for the murder of hundreds of Israeli civilians during the attacks carried out on October 7, 2023 by Hamas", explainedé the ICC prosecutor, who specifies that several of these crimes still continue to be committed.