Exclusive: How Karim Khan’s Israel war crimes probe was derailed by threats, leaks and sex claims
> Already targeted by US sanctions, the ICC chief prosecutor’s pursuit of Benjamin Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders now threatens his career, his reputation, and the future of the court itself
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in reply to Fou • • •Last month, Middle East Eye revealed that Khan was warned in May that if the arrest warrants issued last year for Netanyahu and his former defence minister Yoav Gallant were not withdrawn, he and the ICC would be destroyed.
The warning was delivered by Nicholas Kaufman, a British-Israeli defence lawyer at the court, during a meeting with Khan and his wife, Shyamala Alagendra, at a hotel in The Hague.
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in reply to Fou • • •Cameron told Khan that applying for warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant would be “like dropping a hydrogen bomb”.
According to MEE’s sources, the foreign secretary spoke aggressively and repeatedly shouted over Khan.
Cameron threatened that if the ICC issued warrants for Israeli leaders, the UK would “defund the court and withdraw from the Rome Statute”.
Cameron did not respond to MEE’s requests for comment. The British Foreign Office declined to comment.
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in reply to Fou • • •On 1 May, Khan received another significant threat during a conference call with senior ICC officials, Senator Lindsey Graham and a bipartisan group of senators.
According to material reviewed by MEE, Graham told Khan that if he proceeded with the warrants “you may as well shoot the hostages yourself” and “we will sanction you”.
He added that the ICC was “made for Africa and thugs like Putin, not democracies like Israel”.
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in reply to Fou • • •But one former ICC judge told MEE he was “deeply disturbed, even scandalised by the way the proceedings against Karim Khan seemed to be unfolding”.
In a statement to MEE, Cuno Tarfusser, who served at the court from 2009 to 2019, said he believed Khan was being made to pay a price for his “independence and intellectual honesty, together with his imperviousness to outside solicitations”.
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in reply to Fou • • •“Israel needed to get Karim out before he went for the next warrants,” a source in The Hague who knows Khan told MEE.
“Now, anyone who dares to speak on his behalf will be viewed as complicit in sexual violence.
“It’s clear that there is a campaign to have the warrant for Netanyahu withdrawn. If the campaign succeeds, it will be the destruction of the International Criminal Court.
“And it will be the end of the rules-based order.”
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