Palestinians in Gaza expressed blended emotions after the chief prosecutor on the world’s high felony court docket mentioned he was looking for arrest warrants for leaders of each Israel and Hamas on warfare crimes fees, a transfer that many mentioned equated sufferer with perpetrator.
“We deplore, denounce and are stunned by the choice of the Worldwide Legal Courtroom which locations the accused, the sufferer, and the executioner in a single cage,” mentioned Zahir Essam, a 55-year-old dwelling in Gaza Metropolis.
Karim Khan, the chief prosecutor of the Worldwide Legal Courtroom, introduced on Monday his resolution to use for arrest warrants for Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’s chief in Gaza; Muhammad Deif, Hamas’s navy chief; and Ismail Haniyeh, the motion’s Qatar-based high political official. He additionally mentioned he would search warrants for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Protection Minister Yoav Gallant of Israel.
The announcement in impact handled Israeli officers and Hamas leaders in the identical manner, regardless of what Mr. Essam sees as an influence imbalance between the 2 sides within the battle in Gaza, which started when Hamas led an assault on Israel on Oct. 7.
That assault killed about 1,200 individuals, and about 240 others have been taken hostage, Israeli officers say. Israel’s retaliatory warfare in Gaza has killed greater than 35,000 Palestinians, in keeping with Gazan well being authorities, although their figures don’t distinguish between civilians and combatants.
Many Palestinians view the Oct. 7 assault as a justified response to Israeli violations through the decades-long Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories.
“The Palestinian persons are defending their most simple human rights and preventing in opposition to an occupation and the harshest type of abuse,” Mr. Essam mentioned in a telephone interview. He added that he was stunned that the prosecutor would contemplate “those that defend their rights and their homeland” as equal to “these preventing them with an array of weapons and aircrafts.”
In Israel, the warrants drew the reverse response, with Mr. Netanyahu denouncing the prosecutor’s resolution as a “distortion of actuality” and defending the warfare in Gaza as one among self-defense. For now, the announcement is basically symbolic. Israel doesn’t acknowledge the court docket’s jurisdiction, and judges can take months to uphold requests for arrest warrants.
Jaber Yahia, a 50-year-old trainer from central Gaza, mentioned that he was relieved by the naming of Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Gallant. “I used to be pondering, lastly they are going to be delivered to justice,” he mentioned. However after listening to that warrants would even be looked for leaders of Hamas, his aid was muddied.
“We’re underneath occupation and resistance is a authorized proper for us,” he mentioned.
Nidal Kuhail, a 30-year-old waiter from Gaza Metropolis who was displaced to Rafah, mentioned that he had hoped that the worldwide group and its authorized our bodies, such because the court docket, would have first ordered a cease-fire to finish the lethal Israeli bombardment.
“Step one was speculated to be a compulsory and instant cease of the warfare,” Mr. Kuhail mentioned in a telephone interview. “After which deliver Gallant and Netanyahu to trial as a result of they dedicated warfare crimes documented with proof,” he added.
In search of warrants for Hamas leaders, against this, was “a fallacious resolution,” he mentioned.
Abu Bakr Bashir contributed reporting from London.
