Australia’s Anti-ICC Lobby
Throwing caution to the wind, grasping the nettle, and every little smidgen of opportunity, Australia’s opposition leader, Peter Dutton, was thrilled to make a point in the gurgling tumult of the Israel-Hamas war. Israel’s leaders, he surmised, had been hard done by the International Criminal Court’s meddlesome ways. Best for Australia, he suggested, to cut ties to the body to show its solidarity for Israel.
Dutton had taken strong issue with the announcement on May 20 by ICC prosecutor Karim A.A. Khan that requests for five arrest warrants had been sought in the context of the Israel-Hamas War. They included Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar, the commander-in-chief of the Al-Qassam Brigades Mohammed Al-Masri, Ismail Haniyeh, head of the Hamas Political Bureau, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister, Yoav Gallant.
The measure was roundly condemned by Israel’s closest ally, the United States. US President Joe Biden’s statement called the inclusion of Israeli leaders “outrageous”. There was “no equivalence – none – between Israel and Hamas.” US lawmakers are debating steps to sanction ICC officials, while the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has promised to cooperate with the measure.
The United Kingdom also struck the same note, “There is no moral equivalence between a democratically elected government exercising its lawful right to self-defence and the actions of a terrorist group,” declared UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak during a Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQ) session in the House of Commons. When asked if he would, in the event of the warrants being issued, comply with the ICC and arrest the named individuals, a cold reply followed. “When it comes to the ICC, this is a deeply unhelpful development … which of course is still subject to final decision.”
Australia, despite being a close ally of Israel, has adopted a somewhat confused official response, one more of tepid caution rather than profound conviction. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese thought it unwise to even take a formal stance. “I don’t comment on court processes in Australia, let alone court processes globally, that which Australia is not a party,” he told journalists.
In light of what seemed like a fudge, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade thought it appropriate to issue a clarifying statement that “there is no equivalence between Israel and Hamas.” Treasurer Jim Chalmers followed suit. “There is no equivalence between Hamas the terrorist organisation and Israel, we have it really clear in condemning the actions of Hamas on October 7, we have made it clear we want to see hostages released, and we want to see the Israeli response comply completely with international humanitarian law.”
Albanese’s opposite number preferred a punchier formula, coming out firmly on the side of Israel and donning gloves against the ICC and its “anti-Semitic stance.” The PM had “squibbed it”, while his response had tarnished and damaged Australia’s “international relationships with like-minded nations”. “The ICC,” Dutton insisted on May 23, “should reverse their decision and the prime minister should come out today to call for that instead of continuing to remain in hiding or continuing to dig a deeper hole for himself.”
Opposition Liberal MP and former Australian ambassador to Israel, Dave Sharma, is also of the view that Australia examine “our options and our future co-operation with the court” if the arrest warrants were issued. Swallowing whole the conventional argument that Israel was waging a principled war, he told Sky News that everything he had seen “indicates to me Israel is doing its utmost to comply with the principles of international humanitarian law.”
The ears of Israeli officials duly pricked up. Israel’s Strategic Affairs Minister and Observer of its War Cabinet, Ron Dermer, was delighted to hear about Dutton’s views. “I didn’t know the head of your opposition had said that,” Dermer told 7.30, “I applaud him for doing it.”
In a sense, Dutton and his conservative colleague are expressing, with an unintended, brute honesty, Australia’s at times troubled relationship with international law and human rights. Despite being an enthusiastic signatory and ratifier of conventions, Canberra has tended to blot its copybook over the years in various key respects. Take for instance, the brazen contempt shown for protections guaranteed by the UN Refugee Convention, one evidenced by its savage “Turn Back the Boats” policy, the creation of concentration camps of violence and torture in sweltering Pacific outposts and breaching the principle of non-refoulement.
On the subject of genocide, Australian governments had no appetite to domestically criminalise it till 2002, despite ratifying the UN Genocide Convention in 1949. And as for the ICC itself, wariness was expressed by the Howard government about what the body would actually mean for Australian sovereignty. Despite eventually ratifying the Rome Statute establishing the court, the sceptics proved a querulous bunch. As then Shadow Foreign Affairs Minister Kevin Rudd noted, “John Howard is neither Arthur nor Martha on ratification of the International Criminal Court.”
While serving as Home Affairs minister, Dutton preferred to treat his department as an annex of selective law and order indifferent to the rights and liberties of the human subject. For him, bodies like the ICC exist like a troublesome reminder that human rights do exist and should be the subject of protection, even at the international level.
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Return to home pageThe West’s unwavering support for Zionism rather then international law has doomed it to irrelevance on the world stage.
How interesting it would be to have those five protagonists argue out their cases fot the conflict under the scrutiny of humanitarian law, as defined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
There certainly is no equivalence between these 2 . Israel is an occupying power , with all the strength of US (military bought and paid for) and a tiny entity with no full defense system, totally walled in and pounded into rubble . What l see is full on terrorism by a bully nation that stole large areas of territory , continues to do so, unchecked by mere laws , and a resistance movement that also has blood on its hands . And much of the world sees this too. Is Hamas corrupt? Very likely . Is lsrael corrupt ? No shadow of doubt !
Who suffers ? Far too many children and noncombatants , all powerless , now hungry, maimed, homeless and no way to work to survive all that big weaponry throws at them daily. I shudder to imagine the mental ill health , the festering hatred to come.
Win Jeavons….hear hear!
I’m not sure there an anti ICC lobby, it’s a political lobby.
These were plenty that called the ICC a puppet of the USA when Putin was charged, that are now defending them when Israel is the focus.
Vice versa too.
AC, the braying of donkeys never ceases. America has, as you’d be aware, consistently refused to recognise the legitimacy of the ICC albeit its role in the establishment of the Rome Statute was central; at the level of ratification they squibbed it. To now claim that the ICC is a puppet organisation of the USA is, as suggested, the hee-hawing of a herd of donkeys, worse in fact, given donkeys have innate intelligence.
Dropping leaflets and/or phoning residents of Gaza advising them to leave, without providing safe passage corridors or destinations, prior to extensive bombing leaving few buildings untouched then claiming Hamas were using the residents that remained as human shields therefore making them fair game to be killed, does not represent adequate harm minimisation of the civilian population. For those civilians that did leave, I would have thought that attacking them while on the move would be classed as a war crime. The amount of food/aid being delivered is a third (190 trucks per day) of what is required (500 to 600) and is being regulated by the Israelis. The resulting pending famine is a war crime.
By its actions, the IDF isn’t doing itself any favours. Should they eliminate Hamas, however unlikely as that may be, some other group will form to replace them and the situation then returns to normal: “warring”.
I think the Americans live in a fantasy world and it becomes a very nine thirties fantasy, or psychosis. It is diverting attention away from its own breakdown by pulling out a patsy to blame. Not the Israelis-ever-, but exclusively the poor Gazans. It is not a war, it is slaughter of unbelievable cruelty involving two million tormented people
Some of the commentary is ludicrous, considering the mountain of material presented that incontrovertibly shows up the reality- cant quite understand why some many folk are ok with it, but I suppose its the cumulative result of generations of dumbing down and brainwashing.
The whole thing is sick and Biden is sick. To go to the depths Israel and America have gone, isnt it a bit satanic, or at least dystop[ian?
The criticism of the ICC is political/opportunistic, there is no anti ICC lobby.
Their actions during the past year indicate that its actions are independent of politics.
There was vociferous criticism when Putin was charged, baseless claims that it was acting at the behest of the US
The action against Israel proves the vacuuous intellect of those making those claims
Netanyahu’s government is the most right-wing ever in Israel. A list of actions committed by Israel against Hamas and Gaza/West Bank and listed by ICC makes clear the extent and range of Israel’s war crimes.
So also of Hamas, committed over one day?
Yet there are a huge number of world states who are supporting the existence of Palestine as a state.
What Israel has been doing is to deliberately murder and despoil ordinary citizens with no shame.
Here in our own country, says Alan Austin this week in “Independent Australia”, we have right-wing general news agents lying about the Labor government.
He gives many details which show the economic failures of the Coalition, their general disregard for people (remember RoboDebt), their disregard for climate change, their small ineffective government, their small regard for taxes and salaries (except for the rich) ,their failure to implement appropriate regulations, and their nuclear plan so criticised by CSIRO.
Just look back over the last Coalition government and their recent replies to Labor’s explanation of their economic plans.
I must have spent too much of my life as a cricket tragic, because when I saw the anti-ICC bit in the headline I immediately started trying to work out who here would have it in for the sport’s global administration.
Excellent raft of comments.
The ICJ and ICC have a duty, and they have been called upon to exercise their duty. The ICC’s most recent application for warrants for arrests pertaining to Israel / Palestine and Hamas / Israel matters, has yet to be affirmed by the ICC’s Pre-trial Chamber.
Since the promulgation of those applications, we have been bombarded by political bullshit, including wanton criticism of the ICC and its foundational Rome Statute, and more outrageous bids to effectively obliterate the UN (and no doubt, its treaties). There’s more sleights and feints in all this by gum-flapping politicians across the globe who have been unable to manage their own domestic politics, let alone any international crises. No doubt these cringers are terrified of being dragged to account in any subsequent proper court hearings.
I have not heard / seen any of the aforesaid political bullshit artists address any of the details in the brief announcement by ICC prosecutor Karim A.A. Khan KC.
I tend to agree with Albanese’s stance in not commenting on the International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrants.
It’s all too easy for Peter Dutton to come out with all guns blasting and threaten to withdraw from the ICC were he ever to gain office in this country – an unlikely eventuality in my view.
Like Albanese he has not seen the analysis of the ICC and the evidence that has influenced their conclusion that war crimes may have been committed by the parties engaged in the Gaza conflict.
Biden’s cynycism I can deplore but understand, he has an election to run and the support of the Jewish community in the US is critical to his chances. Equivalence is not an issue and has only been raised as a distraction.
There has, in the meantime been another order issued by the International Court of Justice (the ICJ) which I consider to be balanced, impartial and humane. How will Dutton respond to this ?
The Orders of this Court are :
The State of Israel shall, in conformity with its obligations under the Convention on the
Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, and in view of the worsening conditions of life faced by civilians in the Rafah Governorate:
immediately halt its military offensive, and any other action in the Rafah Governorate, which
may inflict on the Palestinian group in Gaza conditions of life that could bring about its physical
destruction in whole or in part;
Maintain open the Rafah crossing for unhindered provision at scale of urgently needed basic
services and humanitarian assistance;
Take effective measures to ensure the unimpeded access to the Gaza Strip of any commission
of inquiry, fact-finding mission or other investigative body mandated by competent organs of the United Nations to investigate allegations of genocide;
Decides that the State of Israel shall submit a report to the Court on all measures taken to give
effect to this Order, within one month as from the date of this Order [24 May 2024].
https://static01.nyt.com/newsgraphics/documenttools/95964284e55d5c79/b0c539e2-full.pdf
The only way that this binding Order could be enforced would be for the UN Security Council to vote in favour and that would require the US not to exercise its veto.
We shall see !
A Commentator: Agree, and one thought it was a good precision strike on corrupt codependent narcissistic Netanyahu and Hams regimes, neither the nations nor all the people; ICC is being targeted by same Anglo fossil fuel Koch networks who oppose the EU, Ukraine, liberal democracy, transparency and empowered citizens.
For now, attacking the ICC is about running protection for Netanyahu’s corrupt government by his allies on the US right & media, clearly being used to dog whistle and ‘wedge’ the centre across the Anglosphere e.g. focus on Biden-Dems (most Jewish heritage vote for them), universities/campuses, liberal youth, diversity and the educated; add on Albanese-ALP and Starmer’s Labour (not even in govt.).
However, what the same right wing politicians and media ignore, is e.g. behind Trump and the GOP are the sentiments of Reps and groups in the background e.g. Proud Boys, alt right etc. who are both anti-semitic and Islamophobic.
Further, right wing media outlets in the US have been either nudging away from Biden e.g. NYT and polls, or in one case a cable news outlet had been misled (?) into employing for some years, a person who was friends John Tanton, in parallel with Tucker Carlson, who held similar social Darwinist ideas and antipathy towards non whites and/non Christians; NYT has an overview from 2022:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/04/30/us/tucker-carlson-tonight.html
Finally, we then have ‘their’ Jerusalem and ‘The Rapture’ promoted by white Christian nationalists and evangelicals, that would throw Jews, Muslims, other Christians, Arabs, Alevis under a bus…..
One right-wing dickhead said that I was stupid for comparing Potty Boy Dutton to Hans Frank, yet anybody with an IQ higher than that of a pine needle can see the rationale. Hans Frank was better educated than Potty Boy, having attended Maximilien’s Gymnasium and completing a Juris Doctor, Potty Boy attended a private school and did a business degree, but both are political opportunists. The only difference between Potty Boy and Hans Frank is that Hans Frank was hanged as a Class A War Criminal on October 16, 1946, for the murder of Polish Jews during his time as Governor of Poland, and Potty Boy is yet to receive well-deserved punishment for the blatant abuse of the human rights of detainees. Potty Boy is an opportunist who supports law and order when it suits him!
Once Israel started killing civilians, it lost its right to claim that it was fighting anything resembling a just war. I am not anti-Semitic, but I despise the government of Israel.
Am I right in thinking that Hamas was elected in Gaza and is therefore a democratically electedgovernment? Am I right in thinking that Hamas is not a terririst organisation but is, in fact, a resistance movement combatting an occupying force? I contend Hamas can be likened to Fretilin/Falantil in Timor L’Este, Frelimo in Mozambique, or any of the many native organisations which have fought for independence from colonial overlords. As history has proven, the only way to get occupying powers to listen is through violence and that’s what Israel got.
Btw, I hope the good people in Sharma’s electorate remember his sycophancy on Israel at election time.
Would we still be an ally of the Israeli people if we rejected the actions of their government? IMO we have to if we remain their friends. To do so is not antisemitic.
Biden and his Australian sycophants are always ready to discipline other nations under the slogan of “upholding the rules-based order” and “respect for the international rule of law”. But that is only so long as the laws have been made by the US, and are only ‘international” in so far as they can be imposed by imperialist force of arms or by imperialist economic sanctions.
There are no ‘good’ or ‘progressive’ or ‘anti-imperialist’ imperialisms. The decision against Putin was correct. The decision against Netanyahu likewise.
Of course “there is no equivalence between Israel and Hamas”! Israel is an illegitimate colonialist apartheid occupation force and Hamas is a legitimate resistance group fighting that colonialist apartheid occupation
The UN and all its cronies are just a massive waste of time. like all democracies, its achilles heel is that it allows all sorts of nasties to have a say. We have allowed the agenda against injustice to be watered down by the nasties. Power is always bestowed on the undeserving.
I just dont understand why people give dud institutions like the ICC such undeserved reverence. They are late to the party and its closing time.
Red Koala: ‘Biden and his Australian sycophants…’, bit simplistic?
You are falling for the corrupt RW MSM nativist authoritarian trap, on a long term issue, by pinning this all on centre e.g. Biden; include ALP govt. and in the UK Starmer too?
This not only deflects from the same RWNJs, Evangelicals and conservative Catholics (see Alito & SCOTUS) encouraging Netanyahu and waiting for the Rapture?
Meanwhile, too many in Australia left and right, follow faux anti-imperialist tropes on Israel-Palestine, but ignore and indirectly run protection for e.g. Tony Abbott and his friends? He is employed at the Koch-Heritage partnered Danube Inst. in Hungary, led by RWNJs with support from PM ‘mini Putin’ Orban, who is allied with Putin, Xi, Netanyahu, Fox and the GOP?
It has been reported that Dutton has claimed, in relation to the ICC application for arrest warrants, that the Albanese government “turned down an opportunity to give feedback to the ICC when “Australia was consulted in relation to this matter”.
“The prime minister had the opportunity at the ICC, where Australia was consulted in relation to this matter – they didn’t weigh in and say that they were against this measure,” Dutton told reporters. “Instead, they sat on the sideline and had nothing to say about it at all.”
The International Criminal Court is an independent entity, “It is not ICC practice for the ICC prosecutor to consult with all states parties prior to making an application for arrest warrants.”
Dutton lied !
Someone needs to sanction delusional and corrupt blubber-mouth Dutton sitting in Netanyahu’s pocket spitting Israeli propaganda – Before we know it Dutton will have us all silenced on it!
CUTTING THROUGH ISRAEL’S CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY IN PALESTINE, THE PROPAGANDA, BULLSHIT, CORRUPTION AND INTERFERENCE/MANIPULATION IN OTHER COUNTRIES – THE ICC, USA AND UK IN PARTICULAR
So now we know how far Israel and its secret service, the Mossad and Netanyahu will go to secure immunity from prosecution for war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity, or just to hide or suppress them?
(1) They will go to almost any lengths including spying, fabrication, entrapment, smearing, bribery, blackmail, intimidation, threatening, murder and assassination of high ranking officials of the ICC, including chief prosecutors, judges and sovereign national governments including the USA;
(2) Undermine and compromise the ICC, national governments and democracies of other countries including ‘so called’ allies;
(3) Suppress, censor, sanction or threaten international and State media, especially those not already in their pocket like Murdoch’s News Corp, and social media platforms like Facebook so the public don’t get to hear about it – and we already know the people of Israel are fed sanitised news, blindsided by their own government, notwithstanding Netanyahu’s attack on the media, internet, social platforms, the judicial system, electoral integrity and protesters in his own country; and
(4) Suppress war coverage and prevent independent media and journalists from observing and reporting in Palestine, and probably the US also.
We already know they have something to hide and we’ve all seen what it is they are hiding – Serious war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity. So what makes the Israeli government any less fascist, authoritarian, corrupt, racists and dangerous than Nazi Germany or Putin’s Russia or is that an automatic subject for ‘crying wolf’ and elimination on the arguments of non-equivalence or antisemitism; and what is the difference?
One thing is for sure, present day Israel is not a friend of humanity, nor any civilised nation or democracy – nor has it been for a very long time, likely all the way back since formation in 1948. They’ve been getting away with ever since due to coercive spying, intimidation, secretive wars and campaigns in Palestine and international double standards from far too many western nations and democracies; and the lie of antisemitism, which should not be confused with denial of the holocaust in world war II – for there is nothing to deny, it happened – it was unconscionable, Israel has been doing it to its neighbours for more than half a century, and it is unconscionable it has been happening again under our very noses, not with gas chambers but sophisticated American, British and German weapons, technologies and latest horrific and immoral use of AI, which Netanyahu shrugs off as the occsasional and unfortunate tragic error.
Israel must be severely sanctioned immediately and all players brought to justice alongside Hamas – and just for the record that is Hamas not the Palestinian people, women and children who are being slowly and systematically wiped out from the face of the earth (close to 40,000 civilian deaths in less than 6 months and total population of 2.5 million displaced multiple times), along with total destruction of their suburbs, civil infrastructure, hospitals, schools, refugees camps and cities.
…and just as the ICC is poised to finally do something about it because the US, UK and international community refuse to, now we see what Israel has been doing to stop them, undermining and threatening the ICC, coercing the US to do likewise and hence this interminable delay.
Revealed: Israeli spy chief ‘threatened’ ICC prosecutor over war crimes inquiry – The Guardian, 28 May 2024 https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/28/israeli-spy-chief-icc-prosecutor-war-crimes-inquiry
Ah, Romeo Charlie, don’t muddy the argument with FACTS!
If Israel and the USA calls HAMAS a terrorist group, they are a terrorist group, just because in those elections back in 200? they campaigned on building social infrastructure, schools, hospitals and so forth, just because they valued Palestinian lives and were, and still are prepared to fight for them, they are TERRORISTS, get it.
(If you did not notice, you may need to wipe the dripping of sarcasm from your screen.)
Oh and Jon, that article is such an expose of Netenyahu’s exceptionalism. Call out anti semitism at every opportunity but label others with whatever disparagement comes to mind. The ICC prosecutor is not to be feard, ‘she is black and a woman’
sorry about the typos, just got a bit excited… or was that anger!
Further to the election of HAMAS back in 2006, here is a quote from Noam Chomsky’s “Who rules the world” published 2017.
“In January 2006, an election took place in Palestine, pronounced free and fair by international monitors. The instant reaction of the United Staes (and, of course Israel), with Europe following along politely, was to impose harsh penalties on Palestinians for voting the wrong way. “(page 78)
As I recall, the West Bank voted correctly, but that does not seem to have been all that good for them either.