AMNESTY WELCOMES ICC RULING ON PALESTINE

Wed 10 February 2021:

Amnesty International yesterday welcomed the International Criminal Court (ICC)’s recent declaration that it has jurisdiction over the occupied Palestinian territories.

The organisation’s Deputy Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa, Saleh Higazi, said in a statement that the ICC ruling had brought “new hope to [Palestinian] victims of crimes under international law.”

“An ICC investigation marks a long-overdue step towards justice for victims, and is a chance to end the cycle of impunity that is at the heart of the human rights crisis in the occupied Palestinian territories,” Higazi reiterated, pointing out that the verdict would open the “way for an investigation into crimes committed in the occupied Palestinian territories since June 13, 2014.”

In the summer of 2014, Israel launched a brutal military campaign in the Gaza Strip killing over

2,200 Palestinians, the majority of whom were civilians.

On Friday, a pre-trial chamber of three ICC judges based in the Netherlands’ The Hague issued a ruling establishing its jurisdiction over the occupied Palestinian territories. The decision would open an investigation into Israeli war crimes against Palestinians.