Netanyahu Blasts Biden Admin For Rejecting GOP Effort To Sanction ICC

The Biden administration made a sharp U-turn on sanctioning the International Criminal Court of Justice, amid warnings from lawmakers and human rights groups against the move. Isreali Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he’s “surprised and disappointed” that the Biden administration won’t support sanctions on a war crimes court seeking his arrest.The White House on Tuesday said it would reject the Republican-led congressional effort to reprimand the International Criminal Court after its chief prosecutor filed arrest warrants for Netanyahu, War Cabinet member Yoav Gallant and Hamas leaders. That reversed a previous signal from Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who last week told lawmakers the court’s move was a “profoundly wrong-headed decision” and the administration would work with Congress on potentially imposing sanctions.Netanyahu blasted the new stance in an interview with Sirius XM’s “The Morgan Ortagus Show” that is set to air Sunday. POLITICO obtained a clip of the interview, which took place Wednesday, ahead of the broadcast.“The United States said that they would, in fact, back the sanctions bill,” Netanyahu says in the interview. “I thought that was still the American position because there was bipartisan consensus just a few days ago.”“Now you say there’s a question mark,” he told host Morgan Ortagus, a former spokesperson for the State Department in the Trump administration, “and frankly I’m surprised and disappointed.”The comments provide fresh evidence of the deepening rift between the Israeli and American leaders, who have differed over how Israel should conduct its war against Hamas in Gaza.Reps. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) and Chip Roy (R-Texas) earlier this month introduced a bill to sanction the ICC — which targets individuals accused of war crimes, genocide and other international law violations — for investigating and prosecuting U.S. citizens and American allies, including Israel. Calls to pass that measure, or something like it, grew following the court’s announcement, even though the U.S. is not a member of court.The Stefanik-Roy bill would revoke visas as well as block access to a person’s property in the U.S. It’s unclear if those reprimands or others would feature in a measure that sails through Congress, a tough order now that the president opposes sanctions on the court.For months, aid groups have accused Israel of slowing down the amount of aid that enters the territory, leading to famine-like conditions affecting Gaza’s 2.2 million people. Over the weekend, Israel reportedly dropped a small bomb targeting two Hamas operatives that led to a fire in a displaced persons camp near Rafah, killing at least 45 people and injuring dozens more. Israeli forces now have tanks in the center of the southern Gaza city to eliminate the remaining elements of Hamas’ fighting force there.Despite the growing civilian toll in Rafah, the Biden administration insisted Tuesday that Israel’s operation wasn’t large enough to cross the president’s “red line” or spark a policy change toward the ally.Source MSNhttps://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/netanyahu-blasts-biden-admin-for-rejecting-gop-effort-to-sanction-icc/ar-BB1ngXVc?ocid=BingNewsSearchCc seun nlfpmod