Palestinians have accused the Biden Administration of ignoring their suffering for its bias in opposing the International Criminal Court's war crimes probe into Israeli action in the West Bank, east Jerusalem and Gaza.
The US “totally ignored the legitimate rights of the Palestinians to have a viable state, while the Israeli occupation state continues to annex vast areas of the Palestinian territory in an attempt to undermine the so-called two-state solution," said Tayseer Khaled, member of the PLO Executive Committee on Saturday.
Khaled referred specifically to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s speech on foreign policy last week, in which he said Palestinian suffering has been completely ignored.
“Blinken did not even mention a word with regard to the suffering the Palestinian people face under occupation, nor anything about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and its impact on security and stability in the region,” he said.
“This confirms that the new US administration pays no attention to reviewing the destructive policy of the Trump administration," Khaled said.
Blinken did not mention the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in his major policy speech last week. Similarly, the Biden administration's Interim National Security Strategic Guidance published last week laid out a Middle East strategy that spoke of Israel, but not of the Palestinians.
A senior Palestinian official in Ramallah also expressed disappointment with the Biden administration for opposing last week's decision by ICC chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda to open a war crimes investigation into the actions of Israelis and Palestinians.The Palestinian Authority has requested the probe and the presumption is that the focus will be on Israel.
“We were hoping that the Biden administration would adopt a policy that is different from that of the Trump administration,” the official said. “But this administration has shown that it is also biased in favor of Israel. This position [by the Biden administration] will have a negative impact on efforts to resume the peace process. The Palestinian leadership is disappointed.”
LAST WEEK, Blinken said that Washington “firmly opposes and is deeply disappointed” by the ICC decision. “The Palestinians do not qualify as a sovereign state and therefore, are not qualified to obtain membership as a state in, participate as a state in, or delegate jurisdiction to the ICC,” Blinken said.“The ICC has no jurisdiction over this matter," he said. "Israel is not a party to the ICC and has not consented to the Court’s jurisdiction, and we have serious concerns about the ICC’s attempts to exercise its jurisdiction over Israeli personnel.”
Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem called the statement shameful and said it “encourages the occupation to commit more crimes and violations, and makes Washington complicit in the aggression against the Palestinian people.”
The Hamas spokesman added: “This position by the US administration makes the occupation above international law and outside the scope of international accountability, and provides a cover for the criminal actions of the occupation, which fuels the conflict in the region.”
In Washington last week, a reporter asked US State department spokesman Ned Price: “Considering your position on the Palestinians now, where should the Palestinians go to get accountability for what they claim to be problems? To Israeli courts? Where do they go?”
He repeated the question several times without receiving a clear response.
US Vice President Kamala Harris reiterated the administration's opposition to the ICC probe in a phone conversation she held with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu late Thursday night.
“Harris expressed the American administration’s complete opposition to the decision of the prosecutor of the ICC in The Hague,” the Prime Minister’s Office said in a statement it released after the phone call.
The conversation came as Israel continues to seek support in its battle against the ICC decision.
Last week, Defense Minister Benny Gantz reached out to his German counterpart Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer and French Armed Forces Minister Florence Parly.
“I spoke this evening with my counterparts in Germany, @akk, and France, @florence_parly, about the ICC decision, and voiced our conviction that it is a politically-motivated move that is likely to undermine the ability of democracies to defend themselves against terrorism,” Gantz tweeted.
“I reiterated that Israel has a strong and sound justice system, capable of independently investigating any allegations of violations of international law,” he added.
Earlier in the ICC proceedings, seven countries — the Czech Republic, Hungary, Germany, Austria, Australia, Brazil and Uganda — submitted briefs arguing that the court lacked jurisdiction. Canada has also spoken out against ICC jurisdiction in the past.
On Friday, the Hungarian government said it had “always disputed the decision of the Court that the territorial scope of its jurisdiction extends to Gaza, the West Bank and east Jerusalem.”
It added that “Hungary remains a staunch supporter of Israel’s right to defend herself. We sincerely believe that lasting peace can only be achieved through direct negotiations between the parties based on mutual respect. However, the decision of the ICC does not take us closer to this.”