Jerusalem News
(June 19, 2020, 27 Sivan 5780)
Contents:
1. Pompeo warns ICC of 'consequences' for potential war crimes probe of Israel
2. Obama's Last Minute Plot Against Israel by Victor Rosenthal
3. Did Russia Help Prevent the Betrayal of Israel? [at the possible request of President-elect Donald Trump?]
Business as Usual Not Alternative to Applying Sovereignty
by Dr. Aaron Lerner
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1. Pompeo warns ICC of 'consequences' for potential war crimes probe of Israel
https://www.timesofisrael.com/pompeo-warns-icc-against-potential-illegitimate-war-crimes-probe-of-israel/
By TOI STAFF
16 May 2020, 8:28 am 9
Extracts:
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday warned the International Criminal Court against asserting jurisdiction over Israel, saying the United States will 'exact consequences' for any 'illegitimate' investigations.
The ICC's prosecutor's recent decision to accept 'Palestine' as a state with the status to file a complaint could lead to a potential investigation into alleged war crimes by Israel in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
'
'As we made clear when the Palestinians purported to join the Rome Statute, we do not believe the Palestinians qualify as a sovereign state, and they therefore are not qualified to obtain full membership, or participate as a state in international organizations, entities, or conferences, including the ICC,' said Pompeo, who was in Israel for a whirlwind visit on Wednesday.
'The United States reiterates its longstanding objection to any illegitimate ICC investigations. If the ICC continues down its current course, we will exact consequences,' Pompeo concluded.
This week, letters signed by senators and US House representatives from both parties urged Pompeo to protect Israelis from International Criminal Court prosecution, and an Israeli delegation traveled to the United States earlier this year for talks on coordinating a joint US-Israeli campaign against the ICC, Israeli television reported.
An Israeli official told Channel 13 news the trip was timed to coincide with the ICC's approval of a war crimes probe in Afghanistan, as American anger over the decision would underline that both the US and Israel have a common interest in opposing the court.
The ICC probe in Afghanistan will include investigations of war crimes and crimes against humanity allegedly committed by Afghan government forces, the Taliban, American troops and US foreign intelligence operatives.
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2. Obama's Last Minute Plot Against Israel
http://abuyehuda.com/
Posted on June 18, 2020 by Victor Rosenthal
Extracts:
Yes, as through this world I've wandered
I've seen lots of funny men;
Some will rob you with a six-gun,
And some with a fountain pen.- Woody Guthrie
On 23 December 2016, lame-duck President Barack Obama struck back at Israel for her insouciant refusal to acquiesce to the empowerment of her deadly enemy, Iran; and at the same time at least partly kept his promises to pro-Palestinian activists, who had been disappointed by what they saw as his insufficient firmness toward Israel.
On that day, the US abstained on a vote and allowed the UN Security Council to pass resolution 2334, which declared all "settlements" outside of the pre-1967 line, including eastern Jerusalem, "illegal under international law," ...
This was the first anti-settlement Security Council resolution that the US had not vetoed since the Carter Administration. It directly contradicts the position of the Israeli government, which views the territories as disputed, not occupied, and the Jewish communities there as entirely legal ...
While creating dangerous precedents (e.g., for the prosecution of Israeli officials in the International Criminal Court and for the justification of BDS activity), the resolution was passed under Chapter VI of the UN Charter and not Chapter VII, which would justify the application of economic sanctions or even military action against Israel.
.... a spokesman for PM Netanyahu said that Israel received "ironclad information" via Arab countries that "this was a deliberate push by the United States and in fact they helped create the resolution in the first place." ...
Recently, PM Netanyahu told the Israel Hayom newspaper that Obama had planned to go even further:
He and his staff began working on another UNSC resolution, which would have forced Israel to agree to a Palestinian state based on the 1948 borders. Israel's UN ambassador at the time, Danny Danon, sounded the alarm.
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3. Did Russia Help Prevent the Betrayal of Israel?
Business as Usual Not Alternative to Applying Sovereignty
by Dr. Aaron Lerner , 18 June, 2020
http://www.imra.org.il/story.php?id=73685
Extracts:
The revelation that Russian President Putin stopped President Obama from
passing a UN Security Council Resolution setting out to establish a
sovereign Palestinian state complete with a timetable gives an indication of
how things may be anything but the same after the November elections.
While the Kremlin denies the story, as Jerusalem Post reporter Lahav Harkov
notes, the transcript of the December 29, 2016 telephone conversation
between Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak and then Trump advisor Michael
Flynn has Kislyak saying that the Obama administration had been notified
that Moscow opposes such action.
"..We wanted to convey to you and through you to the president-elect that we
have significant reservations about the idea of adopting now the principles
for the Middle East that our American colleagues are pushing for...we are
not going to support it in the quartet or in the Security Council, and we
have conveyed [that] to our American colleagues."