Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives are drawing up draft sanctions that could be brought into force against the International Criminal Court (ICC) should it pursue arrest warrants for Israeli officials over alleged war crimes in Gaza. The lawmakers stress the move is merely precautionary at the moment. The moves are, however, more fierce than anything the group has done to stop the lawfare against former President Donald Trump.
Representative Michael McCaul (R-TX), the House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman, acknowledged Tuesday that legislation imposing sanctions is in the drafting stage. He also emphasized that lawmakers continue to communicate with ICC prosecutor Karim Khan, stressing the repercussions should the ICC proceed with warrants. McCaul said the House sanctions legislation would be an extension of a Senate bill introduced last year that targets ICC officials involved in investigating U.S. allies who are not ICC members — including Israel.
Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR), along with a dozen of his Senate Republican colleagues, issued a letter to Khan on Monday warning him against prosecuting Israeli officials for crimes in Gaza. The Senators said that Khan, his staff, and his family could all be the targets of sanctions and barred from entering the U.S.
Neither the United States nor Israel is among the 124 signatories of the ICC Rome Statute of 1998, an international agreement establishing the global court and its tenuous legal authority. However, in 2015, the Palestinian territories were granted the status of an ICC member state despite not being officially recognized as a country by many nations around the world.
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