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The International Criminal Court Statute Contains a Provision Directly Designed to Target Israel
(Washington Post) Eugene Kontorovich - The ICC's foundational statute (the Rome Statute) contains a provision inserted specifically to target Israel. At the 1999 drafting conference, a group of Arab states secured a significant change in the Rome Statute provision corresponding to Art. 49(6) of the Geneva Conventions, prohibiting an occupying power from "deporting or transferring" its civilian population into occupied territory. The Arab states changed the ICC provision to prohibit "directly or indirectly deporting or transferring" - language that has no parallel or precedent in international law - designed to encompass the self-motivated migration of Israelis into the West Bank. While the provision was understood to target Israel, Turkey has engaged in a massive settlement enterprise in the occupied north of the island of Cyprus. If the Court were to investigate Israeli settlements while ignoring Turkish ones, or Morocco's ambitious settler enterprise in Western Sahara, it would deprive the proceedings of any legitimacy. The writer is a professor at Northwestern University School of Law.