The Hague, 20 May 2024, Global Rights Compliance (GRC) welcomes the ground-breaking decision by Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to file applications for arrest warrants before Pre-Trial Chamber I of the ICC for Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and Minister of Defence, Yoav Gallant. The suspects are believed to bear criminal responsibility for the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare under article 8(2)(b)(xxv) of the Rome Statute as well as other war crimes and crimes against humanity associated with the use of civilian starvation, committed on the territory of the State of Palestine, and more specifically in the Gaza strip, from at least 8 October 2023. Overall, the application requests the issuance of warrants for the following crimes:
- The war crime of starvation of civilians as a method of warfare (Article 8(2)(b)(xxv) of the Rome Statute);
- The war crime of wilfully causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or health (Article 8(2)(a)(iii)), or cruel treatment (Article 8(2)(c)(i));
- The war crime of wilful killing (Article 8(2)(a)(i)), or murder (Article 8(2)(c)(i));
- The war crime of intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population (Articles 8(2)(b)(i) or 8(2)(e)(i));
- The crime against humanity of extermination and/or murder (Articles 7(1)(b) and 7(1)(a)), including in the context of deaths caused by starvation;
- The crime against humanity of persecution (Article 7(1)(h));
- The crime against humanity of other inhumane acts (Article 7(1)(k)).
The situation in Gaza has been characterised by the Israeli denial of humanitarian aid, the deprivation and attacks on objects indispensable to survival (OIS), including food, water, medicine, humanitarian aid, electricity and fuel, and the blatant disregard for civilian life. The selection of arrest warrants for the war crime of starvation and associated violations adequately captures the broader narrative of this conflict, and a common purpose to starve, besiege and erode the dignity of Palestinian communities. This method of warfare has been championed by Gallant and other senior Israeli military and government officials including through the repeated use of dehumanising language, a blatant and publicly stated disregard for the rules of proportionality and necessity, describing a fight “against human animals,” among several similar sentiments.
The ICC Prosecutor was assisted in his determination to file the applications for the arrest warrants by a panel of experts in international law who supported the Prosecutor in evidence review and legal analysis to advise whether the applications met the standard under article 58 of the Rome Statute. The Panel of Expert Report is available here.
The Prosecutor additionally filed applications for warrants of arrest for the Head of Hamas, Yahya Sinwar, the Commander-in-Chief of Hamas’ military wing, Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri, and the Head of Hamas Political Bureau, Ismail Haniyeh, for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed on the territory of Israel and in Gaza from at least 7 October 2023, including crimes against humanity of extermination, murder, rape and other acts of sexual violence, torture and other inhumane acts, and war crimes of murder, taking hostages, and rape, torture, cruel treatment and outrages upon personal dignity in the context of captivity.
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This filing marks a historic milestone as the first time that the ICC Prosecutor has filed an application for arrest warrants on the war crime of civilian starvation as a stand-alone charge under international criminal law. If arrested Netanyahu and Gallant would be the first individuals to stand trial for the war crime of starvation in international criminal law history. Today’s applications are a long-overdue recognition of its specific criminality and gravity.
“This is a watershed moment in addressing this egregious crime, which has long been viewed solely as a collateral or incidental effect of armed conflict, rather than a deliberate and calculated strategy’’ said Catriona Murdoc, GRC’s Vice President and Director of the Starvation and Humanitarian Crisis Division.
The applications for the arrest warrants of individuals in the upper echelons of Israel’s Government recognise both the crime of starvation and the victims of this crime, signalling a potential change in the way the crime of starvation is viewed by both courts and warring parties. These filings serve as a stark warning to belligerents that they will be held accountable for such atrocities and as emphasised by the Prosecutor “Nothing can justify wilfully depriving human beings, including so many women and children, the basic necessities required for life”. Given the breadth of information publicly available, collected by the ICC’s OTP, GRC and other CSOs, GRC sincerely hopes that Pre Trial Chamber I will grant these applications and issue the requested warrants. The Starvation and Humanitarian Crisis Division holds itself ready to support the ICC Prosecutor’s ongoing investigation and any forthcoming arrest warrants by sharing the information it has been forensically preserving with Mnemonic since October 2023 and analysing to date.
Even though starvation indicators have long been present in Gaza, since October 2023, the situation has reached unprecedented levels. After merely two months of hostilities, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) declared that this was the highest share of people facing high levels of acute food insecurity ever classified by the initiative for any given area or country. It found that the key driver of these catastrophic levels of acute food insecurity affecting civilians across the Gaza strip, is the ongoing Israeli ground operations, bombardment and besiegement of Palestinian civilians, trapped in the enclave. In March 2024, the IPC’s latest update confirmed that famine was imminent in North Gaza and Gaza governorates, with other governorates at risk of famine by July 2024. Given the systemic access issues facing humanitarian actors, it is widely expected that significant pockets of Palestine are already in famine.
The Prosecutor’s applications were issued against this catastrophic backdrop. At least thirty-one people, including twenty-eight children, have already starved to death. This is in large part due to the fact that Israel reportedly continues to obstruct, restrict and deny access of aid, including by closing crossings, and deliberately attacking humanitarian workers, convoys and facilities. A particularly heinous example of aid obstruction and the weaponisation of food was the Israeli attack on the queue of starving civilians that had gathered to receive flour, which resulted in the killing of 118 persons and injuring of 760.
Since October 2023, GRC’s Starvation and Humanitarian Crisis Division has been carefully monitoring the unfolding situation on the ground in Gaza and is preliminarily collecting and forensically preserving publicly available information in collaboration with Mnemonic. In parallel we have also been liaising with and supporting other organisations who have been active in pursuing accountability in relation to the unfolding situation in Gaza. In March 2024, we filed an amicus curiae brief to support the lawsuit filed by Palestinian organisations and individuals in US federal courts against the Biden administration for its failure to prevent, and complicity, in the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza perpetrated by Israeli authorities and forces. Our brief outlined the customary prohibition on the use of starvation as method of warfare, including as applicable to the context of Gaza and how the starvation-related conduct may constitute an underlying act of genocide and specifically inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about a group’s destruction, where genocidal intent can also separately be established.
Today’s application is a progressive move from the ICC, one that reflects the reoccurring use of this method of warfare in current and recent conflicts. It offers a critical recognition to victims, survivors and civilians in Gaza and other conflicts, that depriving indispensable objects and blocking or attacking humanitarian aid, will no longer be tolerated.
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Since 2017, GRC has been at the forefront of the development of the war crime of starvation and associated violations, working with a range of state and non-state partners. GRC possesses unrivalled expertise and granular knowledge of the crime of starvation and related violations, derived from a dedicated portfolio of analysis, accountability, and investigative work. This includes multiple starvation investigations, including through the use of OSINT, in several different conflict-specific contexts, including Yemen, Syria, Tigray, Ethiopia, South Sudan, Ukraine, and more recently Palestine.
For additional information please contact:
GRC’s Communications Manager – Inna.Kovalova@grcompliance.co.uk
Vice President and Starvation And Humanitarian Crisis Division Lead – catriona.murdoch@grcompliance.co.uk