Labour expected to drop the ICC challenge over Netanyahu’s arrest warrant
The new Labour government is likely to drop attempts to postpone the International Criminal Court’s decision on issuing an arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu for alleged war crimes in Gaza.
This comes after the new UK Prime Minister assured the President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, that he believes in the undeniable right of the Palestinians to create a state of their own. Starmer discussed the situation with Abbas on Sunday, where he referred to the “ongoing suffering and devastating loss of life” in Gaza.
He also spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to outline the “clear and urgent” need for a ceasefire in Gaza. “He added that it was also important to ensure the long-term conditions for a two-state solution were in place, including ensuring the Palestinian Authority had the financial means to operate effectively,” according to the readout of the call. He described the situation on the northern border of Israel, where exchanges of fire with Lebanon-based Hezbollah have taken place, as “very concerning” and that it was “crucial all parties acted with caution.
Labor officials briefed that the party continued to believe the ICC, based in The Hague, had jurisdiction over Gaza. In a submission to the ICC, made by the previous government, the UK told the court it did not believe it had jurisdiction over Israeli nationals. Britain’s request to lodge the challenge was made on 10 June but was only made public a fortnight ago by the ICC.
The court’s pre-trial chamber had given the UK until 12 July to submit a complete claim. Still, the new government is doubtful about pressing ahead with the claim and removing the potential delay in the ICC pre-trial chamber ruling on the request for arrest warrants.
The UK had argued in its challenge that there was no power for the ICC to issue an arrest warrant against an Israeli national. This was because, under the Oslo Accords, the Palestinian authorities had no jurisdiction over Israeli nationals, so they could not declare that they were passing on that jurisdiction to the ICC, the FO had claimed.
In 2021, it was ruled by the ICC that since the State of Palestine was not recognized as a sovereign state per se, the ICC did have jurisdiction over any alleged violations of ICC fundamental law in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza.
The foreign secretary, David Lammy, said he would this week start reviewing issues such as the future funding of the Palestinian relief works agency Unrwa and the legal advice given to the previous government, which said there was no risk that Israel was using UK arms sales in breach of international humanitarian law.
The UK is now one of the very few countries that has refused to restore funding to Unrwa following a claim that up to a dozen of its staff may have participated in the 7 October bombardment of Israel. UK funding of Unrwa should have restarted in May, but the Conservative government said it would wait until the outcome of a UN investigation.
He insisted on the right to consider the question carefully, adding: “We did raise concerns about the funding at the dispatch box, and real concerns that did not want to see a situation where the UK was contributing to tremendous hardship already in Gaza.”.
