EXCLUSIVE: ICC Prosecutor Seeks Arrest Warrants for Netanyahu & Hamas Leaders

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, INTERNATIONAL HOST: Prosecutor Karim Khan, welcome to the program.

KHAN: Thank you for having me.

AMANPOUR: And of course, we’re here at the ICC. You are today announcing that you are applying for arrest warrants for top military and political leadership in the Israel Gaza war since the October 7th events. First and foremost, explain to me exactly what you’re asking for and who you are charging.

KHAN: Today, Christiane, we’ve applied for warrants to the pretrial chamber of the International Criminal Court in relation to three individuals that are Hamas members. Sinwar, who’s in charge on the ground.

AMANPOUR: That’s Yahya Sinwar.

KHAN: Absolutely. Deif who’s in charge of the Al Qassam Brigade. And Haniyeh. who’s one of their political bureau based in Doha.

AMANPOUR: Let me just — for everybody to understand, Yahya Sinwar is the head of what they call the Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, the military operation, or even wider. Mohammed Diab Ibrahim al-Masri, otherwise known as Deif, commander in chief of the military wing’s Al Qassam Brigade, and Ismail Haniyeh, head of the Hamas political bureau. What are the charges?

KHAN: The charges are extermination, murder, taking of hostages, rape, and sexual assault in detention. So, these are the key crimes that are alleged to have been committed by these three individuals. The world was shocked on the 7th of October when people were ripped from their bedrooms, from their homes, from the different kibbutzim in Israel and people have suffered enormously. And we have a variety of evidence to support the applications that we’ve submitted to the judges.

AMANPOUR: And just tell us what the evidence is. Obviously, the world has seen the real-time images. The Israeli government has put out videos, which is shared to the U.N. and others, journalists about what happened. There are body cams on many of the Hamas fighters, whoever was there at the time. Is that the evidence or do you have more?

KHAN: We have more. We have authenticated videos and photographs. We have CCTV, camera pictures. We have I witness evidence. We have evidence of survivors. I mean, it’s remarkable. The victims and survivors that have — from Israel that have engaged with my office have this righteous demand for justice and accountability. They’ve come here. I’ve also met them in the different kibbutzim and they want justice and accountability. So, we have also expert evidence. So, there’s a whole variety of information that we have authenticated that we think is relevant and probative and that is sufficient, we say, to sustain the crimes that we’ve put forward to the judges.

AMANPOUR: You have also issued warrants against the top political and military leadership of the government of the State of Israel.

KHAN: We’ve applied for warrants. Of course, the judges must determine whether or not to issue them. But we’ve applied today. We’ll apply for warrants for Prime Minister Netanyahu and also Minister of Defense Gallant for the crimes of causing extermination, causing starvation as a method of war, including the denial of humanitarian relief supplies, deliberately targeting civilians in conflict. And the sad thing really is, in relation to both categories, I have been saying repeatedly in Cairo in October last year at the Rafah Crossing, on Israeli television, in Ramallah, everywhere I can to the parties to the conflict, comply now, don’t complain later. And of course, hostages have not been released. That insidious crime, it continues for so many innocent Israelis that are in custody. You know, I held hostage by Hamas and families that are waiting for their return. And of course, we see pictures of starving children, of emaciated children. We have a variety of evidence to support not polemics, but evidence that’s been forensically analyzed to sustain the charge also of starvation being used by Netanyahu and Gallant as a method of war, and it’s awful that in 2024 we have had to submit these applications to the judges of the ICC for warrants.

AMANPOUR: I’m going to get into starvation as a weapon of war in a moment, but first, I want to ask you, the word genocide has been used by both sides, and many believe that genocide is being committed, but you do not, you’re not using that word.

KHAN: Well, this is an active investigation, and we have criminal charges that we can use, genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. In relation to this current stage of investigations, the charges that we have put forward to the judges do not include genocide. But we are continuing to investigate. It’s a very complex situation. We’ve not been allowed access into Gaza by the Israeli authorities. We’re also continuing our investigations in relation to the Hamas attacks and if and when the evidence points us in a particular direction, we will not hesitate to act. So, it’s still an active investigation, but yes, today we haven’t.

AMANPOUR: What is extermination?

KHAN: It’s mass killing.

AMANPOUR: Different than genocide?

KHAN: Yes. Genocide is defined by a specific intent. Not only killing, but an intention to destroy the group in whole or in part. So, it’s a specific intent to destroy the group in whole or in part. So, we’re not — we have not included in our application today a request for warrants for the crime of genocide.