TEHRAN - The United States has thrown its full weight behind Israel since the regime launched its war of genocide on the Gaza Strip more than a year ago. 

The reaction of American politicians to arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) against the Israeli premier and his sacked war minister has also made it clear more than ever that Washington has no scruples about aiding and abetting the regime’s crimes. 

On Thursday, ICC pre-trial judges issued arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant for committing war crimes, crimes against humanity and using starvation as a method of warfare among other inhumane acts.
The majority of US politicians regardless of their affiliation with the Democratic or Republican parties expressed outrage at the Hague-based tribunal.

Sen. Tom Cotton says the US could invade the Netherlands to protect Israeli officials from ICC’s arrest warrants. Incumbent Democratic President Joe Biden whose party lost the November election to Republican Donald Trump called the ICC’s move “outrageous”.

The White House spokeswoman also questioned the court’s legitimacy which is based in the Netherlands. 

“We fundamentally reject the court’s decision to issue arrest warrants for senior Israeli officials. We remain deeply concerned by the prosecutor’s rush to seek arrest warrants and the troubling process errors that led to this decision,” Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters.

She reiterated Washington’s argument that the ICC has no jurisdiction over Israeli officials. 

Republicans took a step further. Senator Lindsey Graham, a Trump ally, called for sanctions on the ICC for its warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant.

Then came the bombshell as Senator Tom Cotton suggested that the United States could invade Holland to protect Israeli officials from the ICC’s arrest warrants.  

“The ICC is a kangaroo court and Karim Khan is a deranged fanatic. Woe to him and anyone who tries to enforce these outlaw warrants. Let me give them all a friendly reminder: the American law on the ICC is known as The Hague

Invasion Act for a reason. Think about it,” the Arkansas Republican wrote in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter. 

The Hague Invasion Act that was passed in 2002, was designed to shield US personnel from ICC jurisdiction. It authorizes military action to rescue any American or allied citizen held by the court in The Hague.  

In mid-October last year, Cotton condoned the Israeli massacres of Palestinians in Gaza saying, “As far as I’m concerned, Israel can bounce the rubble in Gaza.”

In October last year, Arkansas Republican Sen. Tom Cotton called for the indiscriminate massacre of Palestinians in Gaza. Cotton had also said Israel has “every right” to target schools, kindergartens, and mosques in Gaza. He had blamed Hamas for using these sites as military bases without providing any evidence to back up his claim. 

Israel has killed more than 44,000 Palestinians in Gaza since launching war on the enclave on October 7, 2023.

Israel has also ignored a ruling issued by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) that called on the regime to stop genocidal acts. 

The ICJ found in January this year that there was a risk of violation of the rights of the Palestinian people to protection from genocide.

It ordered Israel to “take all measures within its power” to desist from killing Palestinians in contravention of the genocide convention, to prevent and punish the incitement of genocide, and to facilitate the provision of “urgent basic services”.

Israel’s actions clearly indicate that it does not care a whit about international law. 

The United States’s attitude towards the ICC also amounts to a mockery of justice. 

The US has spent a record of at least $17.9 billion on military aid to Israel since the start of the Gaza onslaught.  It has also vetoed four resolutions at the United Nations Security Council which called for establishing a ceasefire in Gaza. 

Irrespective of the US role in enabling the genocide in Gaza, the comments made by Cotton, who is funded by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), highlight the influence of the notorious Zionist lobbying group on the political landscape of America.

Cotton’s threat of military action against the Dutch-based ICC also shows that the US considers its close Western allies as its vassals.