Israel’s prime minister does not know where to go
Not so long ago, Binyamin Netanyahu was eager to compare himself to Vladimir Putin. In an election campaign in 2019, his party, Likud, proudly paraded the Israeli prime minister in posters alongside Russia’s president and other strongmen. Now Mr Netanyahu is terrified he may join another club alongside Mr Putin: world leaders against whom the International Criminal Court (icc) in The Hague has issued arrest warrants for war crimes.
So worried was Israel’s leader that on April 30th he posted a video online to say that issuing such warrants against senior Israelis would be an “outrage of historic proportions” that would “pour jet fuel on the fires of antisemitism”.
The icc has not confirmed that its prosecutor, Karim Khan, is preparing such warrants. But Israeli diplomats say they have had indications that the prime minister, Yoav Gallant, the defence minister, and senior generals in the Israel Defence Forces (idf) are in his sights. They say the war crimes under investigation relate mainly to Israel’s obstructing food supplies to civilians in Gaza during the war with Hamas, the Islamist group responsible for October 7th. “We don’t know for certain if arrest warrants are imminent,” says one Israeli official. “What is certain is that Netanyahu thinks they are—and he’s in a panic.”
The prime minister has apparently been consumed for several weeks by the risk from the ICC. In that period he has reversed Israeli policies on supplying aid to Gaza, delayed a planned attack on the southern city of Rafah and become more amenable to a truce with Hamas. Some in the security establishment think Israel should attack Rafah sooner to put more pressure on Hamas; others counsel caution until a deal has been reached to secure the release of the hostages. The prime minister looks as if he has less and less control over events in and relating to Gaza. Instead he is being guided by the threats and urgings of both his allies and his enemies.
Israel has been threatening to send troops into Rafah, Hamas’s last major stronghold, for months. Over 1m Gazans displaced from elsewhere in the enclave are sheltering there; they would have to be evacuated first. Israeli officials have confirmed that the idf intended to begin that process. Leaflets telling civilians to move had been printed, ready for air-dropping, only for the cabinet to tell the generals to stand down at least twice.
Two main reasons explain the delay. One is intense pressure on Israel from America. Both the president, Joe Biden, and Antony Blinken, his secretary of state, have urged Mr Netanyahu to wait. The administration has thoroughly scrutinised Israel’s plans for Rafah and said they do not provide enough protection for civilians. Israeli generals are grumbling that their political bosses have in effect given the Americans a veto over the operation.
The other cause is the prospect of a deal between Israel and Hamas that would result in the release of a big batch of Israeli hostages in return for a pause in the fighting of at least a month and the release of Palestinian prisoners. Hamas’s demand that Israel pull all of its troops out of Gaza has been a sticking-point. Mr Netanyahu has now agreed, in principle, to a compromise presented by Egypt, which would involve Israel’s withdrawal from urban areas within Gaza and letting Israeli troops remain in only a few locations.
Hamas’s response has been cool. Some of its leaders seem amenable but the final decision lies with Yahya Sinwar, the hardline chief in Gaza, who remains in hiding. He may insist on a permanent truce. That would kibosh the Egyptian proposal, which envisages talks on a long-term ceasefire taking place only after the first 33 Israeli hostages are released.
Mr Netanyahu may backslide, too. His coalition is deeply split over the hostage deal. His partners on the far right have ruled out any agreement that includes a long truce and another delay of the Rafah invasion. Bezalel Smotrich, the finance minister and leader of the ultranationalist Religious Zionism party, has said that a government which accepts such a deal “has no right to exist”.
But the more pragmatic wing of Mr Netanyahu’s government, led by Benny Gantz, a member of the war cabinet and former defence minister, is threatening to withdraw its support if Israel does not accept the deal. Mr Netanyahu worries more about his far-right flank; the loss of its support would bring down his government. But acceding to its demands would worsen his situation regarding The Hague.
Israel has not signed the Rome statute that established the icc. But the court has in the past ruled that actions carried out in Gaza and the West Bank fall under its jurisdiction. America has not signed the statute either. But the Biden administration has co-operated closely with the court, especially over the arrest warrant issued in 2023 against Mr Putin for his involvement in the deportation of children from Ukraine to Russia. Mr Netanyahu apparently thinks the administration has sway over the icc and hopes Mr Khan’s mind can be changed, perhaps under American pressure. But Israel’s prime minister worries that his allies are happy to let him sweat. ■
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