US House votes to sanction ICC over Israel-Gaza arrest warrants

The bill’s passage comes shortly after Mr Netanyahu was invited by US lawmakers to deliver a speech to Congress this summer, although the date of his speech has not been finalised.

Last month, ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan said he had “reasonable grounds” to believe that Mr Netanyahu and Mr Gallant, as well as Hamas’s Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar, military chief Mohammed Deif and political leader Ismail Haniyeh, bore “criminal responsibility” for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity during the war in Gaza.

It marked the first time the ICC has targeted the top leader of a close US ally.

“The ICC has to be punished for this action,” Republican Speaker of the House Mike Johnson said on Tuesday. “We cannot allow this to stand.”

“If the ICC was allowed to do this and go after the leaders of countries whose actions they disagree with, why would they not come after America?”

Israel’s government and Hamas reacted with outrage to Mr Khan’s announcement last month.

Mr Netanyahu denounced the warrant applications against him and Mr Gallant as a “moral outrage of historic proportions”.

Mr Gallant accused the prosecutor of drawing a “despicable” parallel between Israel and Hamas and attempting to deny his country’s right to self-defence.

Hamas – which is proscribed as a terrorist organisation by Israel, the US and other countries – demanded the cancellation of the warrant applications for its leaders and denounced what it called Mr Khan’s attempts “to equate the victim with the executioner”.

If the ICC’s judges decide to issue the arrest warrants, it will be up to its 124 member states – including the UK and many other US allies – to decide whether or not to enforce them.

The White House said in a statement on Monday that while the ICC prosecutor’s warrant applications for Israeli leaders were “outrageous”, it did not support sanctioning the ICC.

“There are more effective ways to defend Israel, preserve US positions on the ICC, and promote international justice and accountability, and the administration stands ready to work with the Congress on those options,” it said.

Created by a UN treaty in 2002, the ICC investigates and brings to justice those responsible for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, intervening when national authorities cannot or will not prosecute.

The US – like Israel – is not a member of the ICC and does not recognise its jurisdiction, but has backed its previous prosecutions and arrest warrants not related to Israel and the Palestinians.

In 2020 under the Trump administration, the US imposed sanctions on top ICC officials, including Mr Khan’s predecessor, after the court began investigating alleged war crimes committed by the US and others in the Afghan conflict.

The ongoing conflict in Gaza began when Hamas gunmen attacked southern Israel on 7 October, killing about 1,200 people and taking 251 others hostage, according to Israeli authorities.

At least 36,470 people have since been killed in Gaza during Israel’s military campaign to destroy Hamas, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.