President Donald Trump issued two executive orders on Thursday, one targeting the International Criminal Court and the other addressing “anti-Christian bias.”
The ICC action imposes financial and visa sanctions on “individuals and their family members who assist in ICC investigations of US citizens or our allies,” according to a fact sheet obtained by AWN, in an attempt to punish the body for issuing arrest warrants for top Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
The Hague-based court slammed Trump’s executive order, claiming it aims “to impose sanctions on its officials and harm its independence and impartial judicial work.”
“The Court stands firmly by its personnel and pledges to continue providing justice and hope to millions of innocent victims of atrocities across the world, in all Situations before it,” the International Criminal Court (ICC) announced in a statement Friday.
The ICC warrants, which were denounced by then-President Joe Biden when they were issued last year, aimed to arrest Netanyahu and Gallant on allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity for Israel’s military activities in Gaza in response to Hamas’ October 7, 2023 onslaught. The ICC simultaneously sought the arrest of prominent Hamas officials, including Yahya Sinwar, who was eventually assassinated.
Critics argue that the warrants suggest equivalence between the leader of a major US ally and the leader of a terrorist group. While neither the United States nor Israel is a member of the ICC, the warrants make travel to any of the 124 signatory nations problematic, forcing the Israeli leaders to be arrested.
The prime minister’s office condemned the warrants as “absurd and antisemitic.”
The ICC’s targeting of Netanyahu also drew criticism from both Republicans and Democrats in Congress. Last month, the Republican-controlled House enacted a bill authorizing the ICC, but Senate Democrats rejected it.
A spokeswoman for Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer claimed Trump’s moves Thursday did not answer Democrats’ concerns about the ICC’s work on Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“Leader Schumer has been crystal clear that the ICC needs to be reformed and reshaped due to its deep bias against Israel,” Schumer’s press secretary, Angelo Roefaro, stated.
He went on: “This EO seems to include the strong provisions that go after the ICC on Israel, but does not include the problematic extraneous provisions unrelated to Israel included in the Republican ICC bill that the Democratic offer sought to fix to protect the ICC’s work against Putin.”
Netanyahu, who is in Washington, DC this week, became the first foreign leader to visit Trump at the White House on Tuesday, standing by his side for a joint press conference as the president vowed that the US will “take over” the Gaza Strip. While the two leaders have had a tumultuous relationship, Trump’s most recent remarks have reinforced the notion that the Israeli leader would have a far broader mandate from the American government to pursue his ambitions with Trump in office.
Thursday’s decision is not the first time Trump has sanctioned the ICC. During his first tenure, he imposed sanctions and travel restrictions on ICC officials as the court launched an investigation into suspected war crimes in Afghanistan by US and Afghan troops, as well as alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity perpetrated by the Taliban.
Trump issued another executive order Thursday against “anti-Christian bias,” which was announced earlier in the day.
“Today, I’m signing an executive order to make our attorney general — who’s a great person, she’s going to be a great attorney general, Pam Bondi — the head of a brand new task force to eradicate anti-Christian bias,” Trump stated during a National Prayer Breakfast event.
