Israel on Monday slammed a ruling by the International Criminal Court upholding a decision to allow the investigation of alleged crimes in the war on Hamas in Gaza as part of its “Palestine” probe, opened in 2021.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry said it rejected the Appeals Chamber’s decision to deny Jerusalem the right to formal notice of a new criminal probe, “as demanded by the principle of complementarity particularly with regard to a democratic state with an independent and robust judicial system.”
“This is yet another example of the ongoing politicization of the ICC and its blatant disregard for the sovereign rights of non-party States, as well as its own obligations under the Rome Statute,” the statement added.
“This is what politics in the guise of ‘International Law’ looks like,” the ministry concluded, noting that the decision of the Appeal Chamber was handed down by a narrow majority of three out of five justices.
Israel rejects the ICC Appeals Chamber’s decision, by a narrow majority, to deny Israel’s right to receive advance notice, as demanded by the principle of complementarity particularly with regard to a democratic state with an independent and robust judicial system.
— Israel Foreign Ministry (@IsraelMFA) December 15, 2025
This is yet…
The ruling states that the probe into the war launched following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre falls within the ICC prosecutor’s existing investigation into alleged crimes committed across Gaza, Judea and Samaria since 2014, which has been ongoing for some four years.
Judges upheld a ruling that there was no “new situation” or “substantial change” requiring Israel to be notified, as the alleged crimes involve the same territory, conflicts and parties already under the ICC’s scrutiny.
The two dissenting judges, Luz del Carmen Ibáñez Carranza and Solomy Balungi Bossa, argued that the lower ruling contained procedural errors as it failed to properly address the Jewish state’s claim that post–Oct. 7 referrals by ICC state parties triggered a new, legally distinct situation.
The decision cleared the way for the continuation of the court’s probe, which led to the issuance of arrest warrants last year for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defense minister Yoav Gallant over alleged “war crimes” and “crimes against humanity.”
Netanyahu on Sept. 4 denounced ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan’s arrest warrant, which accuses him of using starvation as a weapon of warfare, as well as of deliberately targeting civilians, as lacking any factual basis.
“Israel has let in more than two million tons of aid into Gaza. That’s one ton of aid per person and, by the way, Hamas stole much of it,” he said, noting that Jerusalem’s army has also “sent millions of texts and phone messages to Palestinian civilians urging them to get out of harm’s way.”
Khan, who has been sanctioned by the United States over the probe targeting Israel, stepped aside himself in May after being accused of sexual assault, and is being replaced by two of his deputies.
Khan asked at least one of the women who accused him of assault to remain silent so he could issue the warrants for Israeli leaders, The Wall Street Journal reported in May.
