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ICC Seeks Arrest Warrants for Israeli PM, Defense Minister, and 3 Hamas Leaders
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant during a press conference in the Kirya military base in Tel Aviv , Israel, Oct. 28, 2023. Photo: Abir Sultan/Pool via REUTERS
The International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor’s office said on Monday it had requested arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his defense chief, and three Hamas terrorist leaders for alleged war crimes related to the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel and the ensuing war in Gaza.
The unprecedented move marks the first time the ICC has targeted the top leader of a close ally of the United States. Neither the US nor Israel is a member of the ICC. Palestinian territories were given membership in 2015.
Karim Khan, the court’s chief prosecutor, said in a statement that his office had reason to believe all five men — Netanyahu, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas leaders Yahya Sinwar, Mohammed Al-Masri, and Ismail Haniyeh — “bear criminal responsibility” for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Israel or the Gaza Strip.
Israel has denied committing war crimes in the Gaza conflict, noting it has gone to great lengths to try to prevent civilian casualties. Hamas terrorists embed themselves within Gaza’s civilian population and commandeer civilian facilities like hospitals, schools, and mosques to run operations and direct attacks against Israel.
Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group that rules Gaza, launched the current war with its Oct. 7 invasion of the Jewish state. During their rampage across southern Israel, Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists murdered 1,200 people and kidnapped over 250 others as hostages.
Israel responded to the surprise onslaught with a military campaign in Gaza aimed at freeing the hostages and incapacitating Hamas to the point that it can longer pose a major threat to the Israeli people. Hamas leaders have pledged to carry out massacres against Israel like the one on Oct. 7 “again and again.”
The ICC’s decision places Netanyahu and Gallant alongside figures such as Russian President Vladimir Putin for whom the ICC has issued an arrest warrant.
Netanyahu had previously characterized the possibility of an ICC arrest warrant as an “unprecedented antisemitic hate crime.” Some Republicans in the US Senate responded with threats to impose sanctions on the ICC if it moved forward with the arrest warrants.
When asked during a CNN interview on Monday about Netanyahu’s objections, Khan responded by saying, “Nobody is above the law,” and encouraged Israel to challenge the ICC’s jurisdiction before its judges if it disagrees with the proceedings.
Several Israeli ministers lambasted the prosecutor’s moves.
“Drawing parallels between the leaders of a democratic country determined to defend itself from despicable terror to leaders of a blood-thirsty terror organization [Hamas] is a deep distortion of justice and blatant moral bankruptcy,” Israeli war cabinet minister Benny Gantz said.
However, a senior Hamas official sought to portray Israel as the aggressor, telling Reuters that the ICC’s decision “equates the victim with the executioner.”
The charges against the Hamas leaders include “extermination,” “murder,” “torture,” “taking hostages,” and “rape and other acts of sexual violence,” among others.
“The world was shocked on the 7th of October when people were ripped from their bedrooms, from their homes, from the different kibbutzim in Israel,” Khan said on CNN on Monday.
Meanwhile, the charges against Netanyahu and Gantz include “extermination,” “starvation of civilians,” and “intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population,” among others. The charges did not note that Israel has allowed a significant amount of humanitarian aid into Gaza, or that Israeli forces regularly warn civilians to leave before attacking Hamas targets in a given area.
A panel of ICC pre-trial judges will now consider Khan’s application for the arrest warrants and whether there is sufficient evidence to actually issue them.
The post ICC Seeks Arrest Warrants for Israeli PM, Defense Minister, and 3 Hamas Leaders first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iran’s Supreme Leader Says Trump Is Lying When He Speaks of Peace
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei speaks during a meeting with government officials in Tehran, Iran, April 15, 2025. Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS/File Photo
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei accused Donald Trump on Saturday of lying when the US president said during his Gulf tour this week that he wanted peace in the region.
On the contrary, said Khamenei, the United States uses its power to give “10-ton bombs to the Zionist (Israeli) regime to drop on the heads of Gaza’s children.”
Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One after departing the United Arab Emirates on Friday that Iran had to move quickly on a US proposal for its nuclear program or “something bad’s going to happen.”
His remarks, said Khamenei, “aren’t even worth responding to.” They are an “embarrassment to the speaker and the American people,” Khamenei added.
“Undoubtedly, the source of corruption, war, and conflict in this region is the Zionist regime — a dangerous, deadly cancerous tumor that must be uprooted; it will be uprooted,” he said at an event at a religious center in Tehran, according to state media.
Earlier on Saturday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Trump speaks about peace while simultaneously making threats.
“Which should we believe?” Pezeshkian said at a naval event in Tehran. “On the one hand, he speaks of peace and on the other, he threatens with the most advanced tools of mass killing.”
Tehran would continue Iran-US nuclear talks but is not afraid of threats. “We are not seeking war,” Pezeshkian said.
While Trump said on Friday that Iran had a US proposal about its nuclear program, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi in a post on X said Tehran had not received any such proposal. “There is no scenario in which Iran abandons its hard-earned right to (uranium) enrichment for peaceful purposes…” he said.
Araqchi warned on Saturday that Washington’s constant change of stance prolongs nuclear talks, state TV reported.
“It is absolutely unacceptable that America repeatedly defines a new framework for negotiations that prolongs the process,” the broadcast quoted Araqchi as saying.
Pezeshkian said Iran would not “back down from our legitimate rights”.
“Because we refuse to bow to bullying, they say we are source of instability in the region,” he said.
A fourth round of Iran-U.S. talks ended in Oman last Sunday. A new round has not been scheduled yet.
The post Iran’s Supreme Leader Says Trump Is Lying When He Speaks of Peace first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Hamas Confirms New Gaza Ceasefire Talks with Israel in Qatar on Saturday
Doha, Qatar. Photo: StellarD via Wikimedia Commons.
A new round of Gaza ceasefire negotiations between Hamas and Israel is underway in Qatar’s Doha, Hamas official Taher al-Nono told Reuters on Saturday.
He said the two sides were discussing all issues without “pre-conditions.”
Nono said Hamas was “keen to exert all the effort needed” to help mediators make the negotiations a success, adding there was “no certain offer on the table.”
The negotiations come despite Israel preparing to expand operations in the Gaza Strip as they seek “operational control” in some areas of the war-torn enclave.
The return to negotiations also comes after US President Donald Trump ended a Middle East tour on Friday with no apparent progress towards a new ceasefire, although he acknowledged Gaza’s growing hunger crisis and the need for aid deliveries.
The post Hamas Confirms New Gaza Ceasefire Talks with Israel in Qatar on Saturday first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Report: ICC’s Khan Goes on Administrative Leave Amid Sexual Misconduct Probe
International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Khan speaks during an interview with Reuters in The Hague, Netherlands, Feb. 12, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Piroschka van de Wouw
i24 News – Chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court Karim Khan has stepped down temporarily as an investigation into his alleged sexual misconduct by United Nations investigators is nearing its final phase, Reuters reported on Friday citing sources from the international court.
Khan allegedly forced sexual intercourse upon a member of staff on multiple occasions, the Wall Street Journal reported last week, linking the allegations to Khan’s decision to issue arrest warrants for Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and then-defense minister Yoav Gallant.
A statement is expected later today announcing that Khan is going on administrative leave, according to a source in the prosecutor’s office.
The post Report: ICC’s Khan Goes on Administrative Leave Amid Sexual Misconduct Probe first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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