The Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli Defense Minister, Yoav Gallant, as well as the leader of Hamas, Yahya Sinwar, will be subject to arrest warrants by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes and crimes against humanity, following the October 7 attacks on Israel and the ensuing armed conflict in the Gaza Strip. Netanyahu and Gallant are accused of "extermination, causing hunger as a weapon of war", as well as "denying humanitarian aid, deliberately targeting civilians in conflict". In addition, the rulers are also suspected of intentionally causing great suffering or serious injury to people and of willful killing. They are also suspected of intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population, of extermination and murder, including in the context of deaths caused by starvation, of persecution and other inhuman acts. Evidence gathered by the ICC reveals that Israel "intentionally and systematically" deprived Gaza civilians of goods essential to human survival, through the "imposition of a total siege" on the enclave. However, Netanyahu and Sinwar will have to be detained. That is the necessary precondition for the eventual trial requested on Monday by the ICC prosecutor, Karim Khan.

Comparing Israel to Hamas? "Complete distortion of reality"

Meanwhile, the Israeli prime minister accused the prosecutor of "complete distortion of reality", for equating Israeli forces with the "monsters of Hamas" when asking for arrest warrants for both.

"On what authority do you dare compare the monsters of Hamas with the soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), the most moral army in the world? As Prime Minister of Israel, I reject with disgust the comparison made by the Hague prosecutor between democratic Israel and the mass murderers of Hamas", declared Netanyahu, through a video message.

The Israeli Defense Minister, Yoav Gallant, who is one of the targets, also considered the prosecutor's request despicable.

"The attempt by ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan to reverse the situation will not be successful. The parallelism he established between the terrorist organization Hamas and the State of Israel is despicable", said Gallant in a press release.

In this sense, the Israeli government announced "the immediate creation of a special committee" in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to counter this decision, which it called "outrageous". 

"Scandalous", "false impression of equivalence" or "useless". Here's what the main international political leaders say

The reactions of the main political leaders from around the world were not long in coming, with thousands of Israeli protesters gathering yesterday in the streets in front of the Knesset (parliament), in Jerusalem, to demand Netanyahu's resignation and the calling of early elections.

The President of the United States, Joe Biden, reacted to the request for arrest warrants, considering it "scandalous".

"The ICC prosecutor's request for arrest warrants against Israeli leaders is scandalous. And let me be clear: whatever this prosecutor may suggest, there is no equivalence - none - between Israel and Hamas. We will always stand with Israel against threats to its security," reads a statement from the White House, attributed to the US president.