Thread

ICC judge on what U.S. sanctions mean for her and global courts

229 points · 173 comments · rbanffy

msdz · 1790961668 · focus · HN ↗
Regardless of what one personally thinks about the ICC, this isn’t a good look for neither the US nor Europe.
For the U.S., because sanctioning an “unpleasant”, but in essence harmless individual (geopolitically speaking) is ridiculous. Falling victim to de-banking alone can really ruin one’s life.
And for the EU, because it once again showcases the dependence on U.S. systems for just about anything tech-related in everyday life and work.
1. nostrademons · 1790963177 · focus · HN ↗
  It undermines the idea of the U.S. as a neutral arbiter for law, order, and free commerce. That may always have been a fiction, but it's a very useful fiction because it underpins U.S. soft power. It's much easier to get consent for being the world hegemon when you act like a benevolent, disinterested hegemon. Once you start becoming a participant - and overriding other institutions that are ostensibly providing neutral, impartial justice just because their decisions are inconvenient for you - you are essentially placing yourself below them and undermining your own legitimacy.
  Neutrality and objectivity may be a fiction, but it's one of the most useful fictions that have been invented in the last 500 years.
  1. appreciatorBus · 1790963574 · focus · HN ↗
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    [deleted] · 1790963778 · focus · HN ↗
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    NDlurker · 1790964458 · focus · HN ↗
    Who is defending themselves?
    appreciatorBus · 1790966674 · focus · HN ↗
    A liberal democracy was attacked by a force of ultra right wing totalitarian religious extremists. The democracy defended itself and routed the attackers. The ICC took the side of the attackers and issued an arrest warrant for the leader of the liberal democracy.
    NDlurker · 1790967798 · focus · HN ↗
    Huh, I haven't heard of that conflict. Where was that?
    Hikikomori · 1791022261 · focus · HN ↗
    A liberal democracy that carried out an ethnical cleansing at it's start so the right people would have majority once then made it a democracy.
    appreciatorBus · 1791026174 · focus · HN ↗
    It sounds like you have something against indigenous people practising decolonization and want to weaponize international institutions against them.
    defrost · 1791027428 · focus · HN ↗
    Lot of contenders for OG indigenous in various parts of the world, especially that bridge section between Africa and the rest of the planet. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tIdCsMufIY" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tIdCsMufIY
    appreciatorBus · 1791037883 · focus · HN ↗
    It’s kind of like maybe the whole concept of indigeneity should just be a historical curiosity rather than something used to try to settle present day conflicts.
    Hikikomori · 1791032013 · focus · HN ↗
    You do realize the ICC issued warrants for Hamas leaders as well? They're not taking sides.
  2. jfengel · 1790963945 · focus · HN ↗
    America has apparently decided that the fiction is no longer useful. At least not to us.
    I can't say I'm happy about that, but it's a fact now. We cannot put that genie back in the bottle. Even a change of leadership soon will not alter the realization that it can change back on a moment's notice.
    So... we will find out.
    laimewhisps · 1790964089 · focus · HN ↗
    I think we will come to realize that liberalism died in Gaza. It exposed all of the hypocrisy that had always been there, it was just hidden under a mask of propaganda. Exposure to the raw events on social media allowed people to see the difference between what was happening and what we were being told. The mask came off and it's not going back on.
    anramon · 1790965100 · focus · HN ↗
    Less than "liberalism" I'd say "westernism". Liberalism out of direct western influence it's pretty much in line with what liberalism is supposed to be.
    mschuster91 · 1790967261 · focus · HN ↗
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    mindslight · 1790967816 · focus · HN ↗
    Hamas did expect it, just like their kindred warmongering spirits in Israel expect further retaliation. However, Palestinian civilians most certainly did not deserve it.
    slowin · 1790967990 · focus · HN ↗
    The Right to resist is a well-known cornerstone of liberalism, and yes Israel has been chipping away at it since its formation and Nakba.
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_resist" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_resist
    Sabinus · 1790979959 · focus · HN ↗
    The right to resist is not the right to commit deliberate civilian massacres.
    If October 7 had been directed against the West Bank settlers then we could get behind it, but instead it was just Hamas expressing their genocidal intent.
    laimewhisps · 1790981063 · focus · HN ↗
    Occupying forces are not civilians, that being said October 7th was primarily directed at the IDF. That Israel has mandatory conscription and deliberately inhabits stolen Palestinian land doesn't make the victims civilian. That's not even touching on the large number of people in Israel killed by the IDF under the Hannibal Directive. Deaths incorrectly attributed to Hamas:
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannibal_Directive#Claimed_use_of_the_Hannibal_Directive_on_7_October_2023" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannibal_Directive#Claimed_use...
    Cyph0n · 1790981650 · focus · HN ↗
    Firstly, you are aware that Gaza is & was under full blockade, right? And that there is no way to reach the West Bank from Gaza?
    Secondly, I can assure you that you would NOT have gotten behind anything Hamas did. You (not you specifically, just generally) wouldn’t have supported them because you’re conditioned to not support them. You are also more susceptible to propaganda than you think you are, and trust me, the media machine would have been in full gear regardless of what operation Hamas pulled off.
    It is easy to talk about theoreticals, but if you’re missing the ongoing reality, why do you think that you would handle the theoretical scenario any differently? Same idea applies to fiction. People jump to oppose the Empire, but had they been living in the Star Wars universe, odds are that Imperial propaganda would have been extremely effective.
    There is a recent saying on liberals, but I think it applies more broadly: “A liberal is someone who opposes every war except the current war, and supports all civil rights movements except the one that's going on right now.”
    g8oz · 1790968019 · focus · HN ↗
    Did the Palestinian children sniped in the head and chest have it coming as well?
    gamblor956 · 1790968416 · focus · HN ↗
    Did the 500+ teenagers and early-20-something women at the music festival Hamas stormed deserve to be raped, tortured, and murdered?
    mindslight · 1790968937 · focus · HN ↗
    The answer to both of these questions is a resounding "NO". But the question remains of why you have contrasted them as if they are in opposition.
    lossolo · 1790970886 · focus · HN ↗
    What's your point? Are you saying that if you kill my kids then I can kill you, then kill your kids, your wife, your parents, grandparents, their brothers and sisters and their kids? And that's ok and I'm better than you? meaning I'm good and you are evil? or what are you arguing?
    Cyph0n · 1790971509 · focus · HN ↗
    Generally, the point is my people are more valuable than your people. This is how Israel itself is able to maintain the injustice in Gaza and the WB. Heck, the IOF proudly operates under this model: a 1:50 combatant to civilian kill ratio is normal operating procedure.
    They applied the same concept in Iran during the 12 Day War, where they performed “targeted strikes” on apartment buildings housing nuclear scientists and other top officials, while killing 10s of civilians in the process. And then they (unironically) believed that Iranians would rise up against their government instead of rallying around the flag, at least temporarily.
    gamblor956 · 1790976101 · focus · HN ↗
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    laimewhisps · 1790976372 · focus · HN ↗
    What are you talking about? Israel spent decades ethnically cleansing Palestinians and they're still doing it, at scale. They had already murdered orders of magnitude more Palestinians than Israelis killed by the IDF and Hamas combined on Oct 7th.
    gamblor956 · 1791046166 · focus · HN ↗
    Ah, so for you this was never really about what's happening right now. This is about the "decades" that Israel has been "ethnically cleansing" a group of people that have been doing their best to wipe out Israel since its formation.
    The antisemites have been making this argument for decades. It's a popular meme on 8chan and the Daily Stormer. The only problem with the claim is that Israel's military actions against Palestine were restrained until Oct 7th. But then again, murdering 1000+ people in cold blood tends to make the survivors do irrational things to the attackers.
    Maybe Palestine should refrain from violent activity for a period of a year, which is longer than either Hamas or the PLO have ever managed to go without launching terrorist attacks against Israel, and we can talk about "peace" in the Middle East.
    laimewhisps · 1791048013 · focus · HN ↗
    Israel was created through ethnic cleansing, this is all very well documented: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba
    [deleted] · 1790993088 · focus · HN ↗
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    gamblor956 · 1790968324 · focus · HN ↗
    Exactly. Oct 7th was Israel's 9/11.
    Hamas had the option to attack military targets. Instead they targeted a music festival full of civilians, murdering almost everyone, and raping most of the women there. (For those who doubt, there are a lot of sources. CNN, BBC, Al Jezeera, and even the UN's own fact-finding mission all confirm the rapes and murders.)
    Dylan16807 · 1790973810 · focus · HN ↗
    > Oct 7th was Israel's 9/11.
    And the way the US reacted to 9/11 was an enormous mistake.
    Cyph0n · 1790969886 · focus · HN ↗
    This is a 2024 comment. We are past these talking points.
    Do you know what Israel did and still is doing in Gaza (and the West Bank)? It goes way beyond “retaliation”. A genocidal, algorithmic rampage that spared no one. “Collateral damage” taken to its extreme. It is a testbed for techniques to crush armed liberation movements. For the US in particular, this is how the 2nd amendment can be rendered obsolete.
    I am curious. Would you empathize more if Gaza was a Ukrainian enclave in Russia that tried to break free from its status as a blockaded strip of land? Is the involvement of non-white victims the problem? Perhaps it’s because there are Palestinians involved? Maybe if this were a fictional struggle set in some fictional universe involving some kind of “rebel” group; is that what it takes to spare an ounce of empathy?
    RobotToaster · 1790988427 · focus · HN ↗
    This war was started by Israel in 1948
    mindslight · 1790968673 · focus · HN ↗
    That hypocrisy has been there for decades if you had looked, so it seems wrong to consider the catalyst as being "Gaza" rather than things like increased alternative media from digital communications, influence campaigns, etc. Also you're drastically overstating things by balling it up as "liberalism" rather than say the US-as-hegemon world order.
  3. nazgulsenpai · 1790965076 · focus · HN ↗
    As an American, I don't think anyone informed has ever perceived the US as neutral, at least not since the 20th century. We have veto power with control of the US dollar, the ability of the US military to engage in any part of the world (historically, much less so in current year), and being a permanent member of the UN Security Council.
    In my opinion, the sanctioning of these judges simply comes across as a petty tantrum of a nation in decline, using the remaining tools it has at it's disposal to try to get its way.
    edit: typo
  4. gradus_ad · 1790965668 · focus · HN ↗
    As you say neutrality is a fiction.
    Everything the US does and has done is aimed at defending itself and its interests, which includes its allies, as it should, and as it must.
    The extent to which these actions appeared neutral was just a product of the overwhelming power of the US and overwhelming unity - by virtue of deference - prevalent among the Western powers during the Cold War, in the shadow of a common enemy.
    Global neutral institutions exist on a fictional foundation that becomes thinner by the day. For substantial matters on which there is no rational answer, the only solution is the exercise of power.
  5. Amezarak · 1790965750 · focus · HN ↗
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    anigbrowl · 1790967213 · focus · HN ↗
    The ICC was set up specifically to prevent national-scale criminals from hiding behind vague concepts of sovereignty and immunity, such that once someone scaled or inherited the heights of power they effectively had free rein to do whatever they want without fear of repercussions. The incentivized dictatorship as internal opposition was the only legal check on atrocity.
    Amezarak · 1790967948 · focus · HN ↗
    Right. Except national sovereignty exists for a reason. Now an unaccountable international court can hold you liable for doing things they don't like. You didn't solve the problem. You just added an extra institution that will pursue these "aims" in a partisan and particular fashion and will be responsible for its own atrocities sooner or later.
    tmp10423288442 · 1790970900 · focus · HN ↗
    But the crucial point that makes the ICC work is that a country needs to submit to its jurisdiction. Once they went beyond that, they destroyed the entire legitimacy of the court. Also, they refused to arrest Putin even after he was sanctioned by the ICC, despite Russia being a formal party to the Rome Statute, so they're either hypocrites or cowards.
    nostrademons · 1790967851 · focus · HN ↗
    The grievance you express here basically comes down to "Who decides?" The reason the ICC is objectionable to the U.S. (and China, and Russia, and India - there are a bunch of other non-signatories of the ICC agreement, and I'm not picking on the U.S. here, more trying to illustrate a dynamic) is because it sets up a justice system that is not accountable to the U.S. political process.
    The reason I'm saying that this undermines U.S. soft power and legitimacy is because it shouldn't matter who decides. If your country actually stands for freedom, justice, and universal human rights, then another human working from those principles would reach the same conclusion you do. That's what makes them universal human rights. So the implicit message when judges are sanctioned because other nations disagree with their right to make decisions is that maybe those rights aren't universal after all, and that some people's rights are more right than others. It's telegraphing insecurity - someone who knows they are in the right will happily let others make the decision, because they trust that others will come to the same conclusion as them.
    The rest of your post also comes from that frame. You may actually be right - I acknowledged that neutrality and objectivity is likely a fiction. The thing is, that fiction underpins the ideas of rule of law, democracy, freedom, justice, and peace. All of those stem from a basic trust that your fellow humans, once they are trained to think in those terms, will come to the same conclusions that you do. So yes, perhaps all of international relations is power players advancing their own interests - but once everybody believes that to be true, we will lose rule of law, democracy, freedom, justice, and peace.
    Amezarak · 1790968078 · focus · HN ↗
    > If your country actually stands for freedom, justice, and universal human rights, then another human working from those principles would reach the same conclusion you do.
    These principles are not objective moral axioms that we can all reason from.
    We decide, as sovereign countries, what they mean to us, how they should be implemented, or even if we (as a country) don't value this or that. There is no magical tablet of Rights that we can spiritually commune with to determine "X is a right but Y is not." These are all politically and culturally determined.
    So it absolutely matters, very, very much who decides, and millions have died as a consequence of those decisions. It does not make much sense for anyone to hand those decisions over to the ICC. Unless and until we have a single global culture and moral framework the whole idea is absurd...except as a vehicle for the power plays of different factions at the international politics level.
    Because they are politically and culturally determined, because they are not something that people are just born with the innate ability to find, is exactly why handing decisions over to people belonging to different cultures/societies/institutions is highly dangerous. The only way to actually protect our rights is to not accede to institutions like the ICC. It's absurd to say that because billions of people could be trained to believe in things they don't believe in we must act as though the things they don't believe in are universally true, or else we will lose our freedoms. We can simply live in sovereign countries that do hold these beliefs - and as for the countries that do things we find revolting, we can pressure them or ignore them or war with them as we see fit and as has been done since the dawn of time. But ultimately you have to accept that different cultures have different values, even if you're one of those that want to do something about it. You can't just stick your head in the sand and pretend the ICC actually adheres to these ideals.
  6. tmp10423288442 · 1790970786 · focus · HN ↗
    In this case, the US and Israel were never parties to the ICC, so the ICC was never neutral with respect to them. If they had submitted to the ICC, I think your point would be valid.
    nostrademons · 1790972336 · focus · HN ↗
    I'm making a subtly different point. Pre-2002, the U.S. filled the role that the ICC does now. We would work multilaterally with a lot of different countries - many of whom are signatories of the Rome Statute now - to send UN peacekeeping forces to conflict areas and bring the perpetrators of genocide and crimes against humanity to justice. Post-2002 (and there was a lot going around in 2002-2004 to tarnish the U.S's international reputation besides the ICC), we became one of several parties that didn't sign the ICC. And now we seem to be actively retaliating against ICC judges, and not even for their decisions - this case is because the judge held that a decision could be made.
    A lot of Americans believe that power is winning. There's a fight, and the side that wins is the more powerful one. But true power comes from not having anyone question your decisions, such that there is never a fight in the first place. And that's the dynamic I'm commenting on. Eisenhower was a powerful president even though he started no new wars (indeed, he ended the Korean war). With 70%+ approval ratings domestically and unquestioned economic supremacy abroad, he didn't need to.

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