American President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday (6) sanctioning the International Criminal Court (ICC), confirmed the White House.
The Order accuses the ICT of “being involved in illegitimate and unfounded actions” aimed at the US and its “close ally” Israel, stating that the Court “abused its power” by issuing “unloved” arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
The document declares that the “ICC has no jurisdiction over the United States or Israel, since neither countries is part of the Rome status or a member of the ICC.”
Donald Trump’s executive order warns that the US will impose “tangible” and “significant” consequences on individuals who work on US or US allies investigations such as Israel.
Sanctions include the freezing of any US assets of these individuals and the prohibition of US entry to them or their families.
The ICC has been preparing for US sanctions since Donald Trump’s inauguration last month.
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The US president has been a vocal critic of the ICC since the court issued arrest warrants to Netanyahu and Gallant last November for alleged war crimes and humanity crimes in Gaza, along with several Hamas leaders.
At the time, the ICC stated that he had found reasonable grounds to believe that Netanyahu and Gallant “have criminal responsibility for (…) crime of food deprivation as a method of war and crimes against humanity of murder, persecution and other dehuman acts ”.
In addition, the three -judge panel said there were reasonable grounds to believe that they have criminal responsibility “as civilian superiors for the crime of war to intentionally direct an attack on the civilian population.”
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The ICC depends on 125 signatory states of the Rome Statute to execute arrest warrants. Neither Israel nor the US are members.
