PA Denies Deal Was Made to Halt ICC Bid in Exchange for Unfreezing Tax Revenues
The Palestinian Authority has denied that an Israeli move to unfreeze the PA’s tax revenues was part of a deal to get the Palestinians to halt their bid to have Israel prosecuted at the International Criminal Court (ICC) Ha’aretz reported yesterday. The report cited an anonymous senior Palestinian official.
“We continue to seek membership of the International Criminal Court and we expect the ICC to open an investigation into Israeli settlements, as well as the recent war in Gaza,” the official said.
“The reports in the Israeli newspapers are nothing more than spin from Netanyahu’s bureau; there was no such agreement. The money that Netanyahu transferred is Palestinian money and he isn’t doing us any favors.” …
“This Wednesday,” he said, “Palestine will become a member of the ICC and the Palestinian Foreign Minister, Dr. Riyad al-Maliki, will represent the Palestinians in The Hague.” He added that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said as much during the Arab League summit in Egypt over the weekend.
Last week, Israel announced that it would transfer tax revenues it had withheld in response to the Palestinian efforts to have Israel prosecuted in the ICC. Earlier this week, The Jerusalem Post reported that the funds were released in exchange for the Palestinians dropping their bid to have Israel prosecuted in the ICC. The PA officially joins the the ICC on Wednesday.
The Palestinian effort to use international organizations to pressure Israel was spelled out in a 2011 op-ed in which Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas threatened “to pursue claims against Israel at the United Nations, human rights treaty bodies and the International Court of Justice.”
In its efforts to avoid bilateral negotiations, the means for achieving statehood long accepted and promoted by the international community, the PA last year signed on to 15 international conventions— while it was in violation of 11 of them. At the end of last year, Abbas signed onto nearly two dozen more treaties. One of them was the Rome Statute, which is the treaty for joining the ICC. The PA joined the ICC in defiance of the United States State Department.
In response to the PA’s bid to join the ICC, Israel started withholding tax revenues that it collected for the PA, and prompted bipartisan legislation to cut American aid to the PA as long as it pursued unilateral actions against Israel.
In addition to the diplomatic fallout from the ICC bid, the action also opened up the Palestinians to possible scrutiny for war crimes vioalations from the ICC, due to last year’s unity agreement with the terrorist group Hamas.
