The violent takeover of the Mavi Marmara simply does not stack up to other violent mass executions of passive civilians. Referring a relatively minor incident to the ICC in the context of a highly politically charged conflict would confirm the suspicions that the court is no more than a political wolf camouflaged in the neutral trappings of criminal justice. By Noam Wiener On May 14, the Union of Comoros, represented by Turkish attorneys, sent the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) a referral requesting it commence an investigation into Israeli conduct, due to alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity. The…

How is this Palestinian Authority UN statehood bid different from last year's? What's an observer state? What does it mean for Oslo, or for the settlements? The Association for Civil Rights in Israel has the answers. The Chairman of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, recently announced that on 29 November [today] he intends to turn to the United Nations General Assembly, requesting to upgrade the Palestinian Authority's status in the UN from an "observer entity" to a "non-member observer state." This initiative follows the Palestinian bid to the UN Security Council in September 2011, asking to admit Palestine to the…

The Palestinian bid for statehood at the UN has Israel especially worried about one implication from the move - Israeli conduct on Palestinian territory becoming subject to the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. By Noam Wiener Tomorrow is November 29, a day that in my childhood memories is associated with a static recording reading: “Afghanistan, no; Argentina, abstain; Australia, yes” and with black and white photos of people dancing in circles in the streets of Tel Aviv following the approval of the Partition Plan for Palestine.  But children today will have a different memory. Obviously many Israeli opinion makers…

Luis Moreno Ocampo has a big decision to make: should he recognize the Palestinian territories as a state? One of the most important decisions concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the near future could soon be made not by a local leader (not surprising), but by an Argentinian lawyer. Meet Luis Moreno Ocampo, the first Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC). Israel, along with the United States and Sudan, ratified the Rome Statute which created the ICC - only to later “unsign” themselves. But this past week, Ocampo heard Israel’s case against a Palestinian strategic move that could change the…