Commentary Magazine..
08 January '15..
In the wake of their failed attempt to get the United Nations Security Council to vote to recognize their independence without first making peace with Israel, the Palestinian Authority has begun the process of joining the International Criminal Court, where they will, according to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, become full members on April 1. Their goal is to use this platform to harass Israel and to launch war-crimes trials against the Jewish state. This is widely seen as a credible threat against the Israelis who have been unfairly assailed for their conduct when fighting Hamas terrorists in Gaza. But the PA shouldn’t be so eager to head to court. The efforts of Shurat HaDin—Israel Law Center to charge Palestinian leaders with war crimes could turn the tables on them in a way that may cause them to regret their decision.
Though the U.S. has rightly argued that as a non-state, the PA cannot actually be part of the ICC, the UN has gone along with this farce. This will allow the Palestinians to begin making mischief for the Israelis by filing suits that will publicize a raft of specious charges all aimed at branding it as an “apartheid state” run by war criminals. This gambit not only helps the Palestinians avoid peace talks where they might be forced to either make peace with Israel or admit that they will never do so. It also aids their ongoing efforts to delegitimize Israeli self-defense against terrorist attacks like Hamas’s use of tunnels for cross-border kidnapping/murder raids and the launching of thousands of rockets at Israeli cities.
But the PA has opened up a Pandora’s box that they may not be able to close before it damages their own cause.
Shurat HaDin has gained an impressive reputation in the last decade for its vigorous efforts to use the law to hold Palestinian terror groups responsible for their crimes. It has successfully sued Palestinian groups and their backers for their involvement in terrorism. That has placed funders of terrorism and banks which make such actions possible in peril as their victory in federal court in New York showed last September when Jordan’s Arab Bank was held responsible for its role in passing along funds to Hamas. It is also poised to land another blow to the Palestinian Authority and the Palestine Liberation Organization after a federal appeals court ruled this week that it could proceed with a $1 billion suit filed by the group on behalf of dozens of U.S. citizens and their families that were victims of Palestinian terrorism during the second intifada.
But even as the PA readies its efforts to attack the Israelis at the ICC, Shurat HaDin is preparing its own assault on both Fatah and Hamas. On Monday, it filed charges of war crimes, terrorism, and human-rights offenses against three members of PA leader Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah Party: PA Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah, minister Jibril Rajoub, and PA intelligence chief Majad Haraj. Prior to this, it had filed similar charges against Abbas as well as Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal.
Skepticism about the willingness of any international agency to deal fairly with Israel is justified. The UN is a stacked deck against the Jewish state and it is possible that the ICC will prove to be just as biased. But as a judicial body, the ICC isn’t quite as easy to manipulate as other UN agencies. That means that evidence and truth will play a far larger role in their proceedings than at the UN General Assembly. And that is very bad news for the Palestinians.
After all, the actions of Hamas and Fatah in carrying out terror attacks, using civilians as human shields, and violating international law are not open to much dispute. Nor is the fact that the PA and Hamas violently oppress their own people.
As Nitsana Darshan-Leitner told the Times of Israel:
“Abbas and his friends in terror organizations believe that the courts can be used as a weapon against Israel, while at the same time, the Palestinian leadership carries out crimes with utter impunity against their own people and against Israeli civilians.
“The PA and Hamas have to understand that the International Criminal Court is a double-edged sword,” Darshan-Leitner said. “Years of murder, acts of terrorism and incitement will now be brought before prosecutors for investigation.”
False prosecutions brought against it in the ICC may well tie up Israel. But the same can just as easily be said about the Palestinians. Though they may have an international community that has proved tolerant of anti-Semitism on their side, the Palestinians need to understand that they are at least as vulnerable as the Israelis if not more so. The world’s hypocrisy when it comes to attacks on Jews has convinced them that they have nothing to lose. By putting their own actions under a legal microscope, there’s little chance that the PA will come out of this unscathed, let alone victorious.
Though these cases are likely to be dragged out over the years, the Palestinians may come to regret their decision to use the UN to wage lawfare against Israel. Before it’s done, Shurat HaDin’s successful record in various courts may make Abbas and his cronies wish they had never heard of the ICC.
Link: https://www.commentarymagazine.com/2015/01/08/palestinians-should-be-wary-of-icc-gambit-war-crimes/#more-855747
Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.
.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment