House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said Tuesday that the House will vote on a bill that seeks to hold the International Criminal Court accountable over arrest warrants for Israeli officials.
“This week the House will vote to impose sanctions on ICC officials, and put the ICC prosecutor Karim Khan back in his place,” Johnson said.
“(Khan) does not have jurisdiction over Israel or the United States, and it is outrageous that they’re issuing arrest warrants for (Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu) and (former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant).”
Rep. Burgess Owens, in a statement posted to X, said, the ICC “is blind to its own hypocrisy and the dangerous implications of targeting Israel as it works to secure the safe return of all hostages and destroy the Hamas terrorist network.” He added he will vote in favor of the ICC sanctions on Thursday.
ICC claims PM Netanyahu committed war crimes
Khan’s office submitted applications for arrest warrants for Israeli and Gaza officials in May 2024. But they withdrew the requests for Yahya Sinwar, then head of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, and Ismail Haniyeh, former head of the Hamas Political Bureau, after their deaths were confirmed.
The White House didn’t agree with the decision to issue arrest warrants for Israeli officials. President Joe Biden called the move “outrageous,” saying, “there is no equivalence — none — between Israel and Hamas,” and said the U.S. will stand by Israel.
In November 2024, Khan’s office said the ICC found “reasonable grounds to believe” Netanyahu and Gallant “committed the war crime of using starvation as a method of warfare and crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts, as a direct perpetrator, acting jointly with others.”
Israel and the U.S. are not a part of the ICC, which includes 125 other countries.
“The ICC is actually equating Israel and Hamas, even as Hamas still holds Israeli and American hostages. It is just absurd,” the House speaker added. “The House will not tolerate rogue actors who circumvent international law to attack Israel and threaten America. We won’t do it,” Johnson made clear.
GOP bill to hold ICC accountable
The Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act, reintroduced by Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, on Friday, would impose these sanctions.
“If we do not check this rogue, leftist ‘court’ now, we can rest assured that our military leadership and troops will be the next targets of its political attacks,” Roy said, according to a press release issued last week.
“While I have full confidence that President Trump will stand for Israel with the strength and moral clarity that Biden has sorely lacked, this bill will ensure that no future administration after him will be able to give the ICC a free pass to attack our allies like this.”
The ICC sanctions bill passed the House in the last Congress, with 42 Democrats voting in favor. But it was stymied in the Senate as former Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York never brought it to the floor for a vote.
At the time, Johnson criticized the Biden administration for undermining Israel. “And now, 155 House Democrats have voted to give the ICC a free pass to target our allies and undermine U.S. national security interests,” he added on June 4, 2024.
The Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act states, “The ICC’s actions against Israel are illegitimate and baseless, including the preliminary examination and investigation of Israel and applications for arrest warrants against Israeli officials, which create a damaging precedent that threatens the United States, Israel and all United States partners who have not submitted to the ICC’s jurisdiction.”
“The United States must oppose any action by the ICC against the United States, Israel or any other ally of the United States that has not consented to ICC jurisdiction or is not a state party to the Rome Statute of the ICC,” the bill adds.