Washington, D.C., is a town divided, with major pieces of legislation stalled, collegiality between Republicans and Democrats virtually nonexistent, and congressional hearings descending into juvenile name-calling that would be sad in the schoolyard, let alone in the halls of Congress. But if there is one thing that has brought everybody together this week, it’s Karim Khan, the chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (ICC), who filed war crimes charges against three senior Hamas members and two senior Israeli officials, including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu himself.
The reactions on and off Capitol Hill were swift. House Speaker Mike Johnson announced that the House was prepared to vote on sanctions targeting the ICC for in effect suggesting Netanyahu and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant were possible war criminals who needed to be at the Hague. President Joe Biden, in a terse statement, bluntly called the ICC prosecutor’s decision “outrageous.” Testifying in front of a Senate Appropriations subcommittee this week, Secretary of State Antony Blinken even stated that the administration would “welcome” working with Congress on sanctions against the ICC.
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