The International Criminal Court may issue arrest warrants for each Israeli and Hamas leaders within the wake of Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attacks on Israeli civilians and the next Israeli invasion of Gaza, according to Israeli officials and what The New York Times and other sources mass media called “foreign officials”.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is one of them individuals who may be named within the arrest warrant Already this week, the Israeli every day Haaretz reported April 28, 2024.

The ICC, an independent tribunal based in The Hague, Netherlands, prosecutes genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes – the latter legal term which incorporates attacks on civilians and other crimes. violations of martial lawSuch as blocking humanitarian aid.

Karim Khan, the present chief prosecutor of the ICC, announced in November 2023 that he would launch an investigation into Hamas and Israeli suspects following the Hamas attack in Israel that killed 1,200 people and kidnapped tons of more, and Israel’s subsequent war in Gaza, which has thus far over 34,000 Palestinians died.

ICC criminal investigation appears right after the famous genocide case which South Africa brought against Israel in December 2023 before one other international tribunal called the International Court of Justice.

But these investigations and courts are different. Although the ICC may conduct trials of those allegedly answerable for criminal violations of international humanitarian law, the International Court of Justice is the part of the United Nations that adjudicates civil and civil disputes. cannot accuse individuals of crimes.

How human rights researcher and international courts, I consider it is vital to emphasize that international criminal tribunals do not have enforcement powers of their very own. And meaning they could never be able to arrest suspects or bring them to justice.

Therefore, these international courts have had mixed experiences in holding senior political and military leaders accountable for his or her crimes. Only when political leaders lose power is there a likelihood that their governments will arrest them and hand them over to international courts for prosecution.

A challenge for international courts

Take the instance of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has been opposing an ICC arrest warrant since March 2023 for allegedly committing war crimes throughout the Ukrainian war. As long as Putin stays in power, there’s virtually no likelihood of his arrest.

International criminal tribunals just like the ICC have a two-fold problem. First, these tribunals haven’t any real international police force to perform arrests.

Second, governments implicated within the alleged crimes of their leaders often try to obstruct the work of international tribunals by not handing over suspects and trying to attack the tribunals as biased.

The problem of enforcement, as my scholarship has showncould allow the leaders of a robust country like Israel to avoid arrest warrants issued by international courts – provided the suspects remain within the country.

Israel is in this case is not a celebration to the ICC, meaning that he has never agreed to abide by his judgments or arrest orders and does not otherwise recognize the court’s jurisdiction. The United States and other countries, including Qatar, where some Hamas leaders live, are also not members of the ICC and haven’t any legal obligation to make arrests.

This signifies that if the ICC issues an arrest warrant for Netanyahu, he will be able to go to meet US leaders in Washington without fear of arrest. But he could not easily go to European Union countries, all of that are members of the ICC, and would be forced to arrest Netanyahu.

It is unclear what precisely the ICC’s alleged allegations might include. However, Netanyahu and other Israeli political and military leaders may now avoid traveling to ICC member states in order not to risk arrest if a warrant is issued.

All this may also contribute to Israel’s development further international isolation and pressure on his conduct throughout the war.

Prosecuting Hamas leaders involved within the October 7 atrocities could similarly stigmatize Hamas internationally.

The United States, which at times strongly opposed the ICC, but additionally supported the ICC the court on an ad hoc basis, he warned that issuing arrest warrants for Israeli leaders could jeopardize a possible ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas.

Milosevic’s fall from power

Not all arrest warrants fail.

Attempt Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic from the mid-2000s shows how international tribunals might be able to prosecute alleged war criminals after they lose power.

In 1993, while the war in Bosnia was still ongoing, the UN Security Council established a special court, called the Tribunal for International Criminal Tribunal for the previous Yugoslaviato address crimes committed during regional wars.

This court indicted Serbian nationalist leader Slobodan Milosevic for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in 1999 throughout the ongoing war in Kosovo. Milosevic’s alleged crimes in Kosovo include a large ethnic cleansing campaign against Kosovo Albanians, the country’s largest ethnic group. Milosevic later faced additional charges for alleged crimes in Bosnia and Croatia.

However, on the time of the indictment, Milosevic was still in power and his government protected him from arrest. Milosevic lost the presidential election in late September 2000 and after widespread protests he gave in.

The United States promised the brand new democratic government in Serbia significant economic aid to speed up post-war recovery. This helped persuade the Serbian government to achieve this arrest Milosevic and then move it to international tribunal in June 2001.

A possible handbook for the leaders of Israel and Hamas

Milosevic trial was launched in February 2002but he died in prison in 2006, shortly before the tip of the trial.

His trial continues to show that, under certain circumstances, international courts can overcome their lack of enforcement powers and bring high-level suspects to justice. International political pressures and incentives often play a pivotal role on this process.

As long as any political and military leaders facing potential arrest remain in power, it is probably going that no amount of political pressure or guarantees will persuade Israel, Qatar or other countries to cooperate with the international court and hand over any leaders in the event that they are indicted.

History also shows that even if Hamas leaders are overthrown or Israeli leaders lose the elections, there isn’t any guarantee that potential suspects will ever face the ICC.

In Israel, there’s broad public opposition to the ICC, which Netanyahu has attacked prior to now for “pure anti-Semitism”, will probably proceed. Moreover, at the very least within the short term, it’s unlikely that the United States will apply to its close ally, Israel, the identical pressure that it successfully applied to Serbia after Milosevic fell from power.

Kahn did not comment on reports of possible arrest warrants. Nevertheless, Israeli officials they went on the offensive in an apparent attempt to gain American support to prevent ICC motion.

Maps, although seemingly objective representations of the world, have enormous power. They shape our understanding of space, determine the directions of our travels and define political boundaries. But beneath the façade of neutrality lies the potential for manipulation.

The history of warfare is replete with examples of maps being used to dehumanize the enemy. Some of them are very obvious. Satirical maps were created by all sides of the First World War, depicting Europe as a series of caricatures intended to dehumanize enemy states and push a narrative of victory in the war.

Other examples are less obvious. During the Vietnam War, the US military created maps that marked specific regions of Vietnam “free fire zones”, meaning that any person or activity inside this zone could also be considered hostile and a goal for military force. This tactic effectively worn out the civilian population from the map, treating your complete area as an enemy stronghold.

The dehumanizing effect of maps comes from their inherent abstraction. Maps simplify reality by reducing a fancy landscape teeming with life and history to lines, symbols and colours. While needed for clarity, this simplification often results in the removal of the human element.

For example, the map below shows the locations of known Russian military and ground attacks following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. The map uses symbols to simplify the conflict. We later learned that one of these cartoon-like icons represents Bucha massacre in which Russian forces reportedly killed 458 Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war.

Fueling conflict

Maps may also be used to bolster the “us versus them” mentality that fuels conflict. They create a visible distinction between “our side” and “theirs”, clearly marking enemy territory.

The day before Genocide in Rwanda in 1994, extremist Hutu media produced maps which divided Rwandans based on ethnicity: Hutu and Tutsi. These maps were not only geographical representations, they were identification and tracking tools.

Maps often used contrasting colours to sharply separate Hutu and Tutsi areas. This visual distinction created a transparent separation between the in-group (Hutu) and the out-group (Tutsi), promoting the concept Tutsis are not part of the material of Rwanda.

Some maps went further, using symbols similar to machetes or snakes to represent Tutsis, depicting them as brutal and dangerous. These maps were widely distributed through newspapers and radio broadcasts. They not only identified Tutsis, but additionally served as visual propaganda to justify violence against them.

This visual separation promotes a way of distance and difference, making it easier to perceive the enemy as an abstract threat fairly than other people. Propaganda maps exploit this effect by exaggerating the dimensions of enemy territory or depicting the enemy population as faceless masses.

Removing an individual from the map

The IDF’s introduction of grid maps to Gaza in December 2023 introduced one other way of dehumanizing the population. Like free fire zones throughout the Vietnam War, Israel divided Gaza into over 600 blocks, ostensibly to assist evacuation of civilians.

Any block on the map that may be reached via a QR code found on leaflets and social media posts can receive evacuation warnings before that square is bombed. However, support staff do warned that the map risks turning life in Gaza right into a “battleship game” in which the flattening of any given grid square is justified by the looks that it’s an empty spot on the map.

Maps also influence the best way we, as observers, perceive conflicts. This may extend beyond the battlefield. Maps often depict refugees as a homogeneous mass, leaving out the person histories and desires that drove them from their homes.

In the early stages of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, for instance, the BBC got here under fire in the case of one map that shows the movement of refugees with arrows. People on social media he suggested that these symbols commanded invasion fairly than flight. In response to criticism, the BBC updated the map to make use of proportional circles as a substitute.

Homework is completed

The dehumanization inherent in war maps is just not inevitable. For example, including civilian infrastructure and population density in military maps could be a constant reminder of the human costs of conflict. Oral histories and community map projects can even offer alternative perspectives on the land, highlighting the human histories often erased by military cartography.

The conflict in Gaza has shown that lessons are being learned about how you can higher use maps during conflict. Reutersfor instance, maps were used together with other textual and visual elements to assist tell a fuller story and complete what maps alone could never achieve.

Ultimately, maps are tools that may be used for good or evil. We must strive to look beyond the lines and symbols and remember the people whose lives are affected by the conflicts depicted on the maps.

Sitting in Wadi Araba under the blazing midday sun, senior Jordanian officials and their Israeli counterparts signed the declaration historic peace agreement in 1994, which ended a long time of conflict between the two countries. It was the second peace agreement that Israel had signed with an Arab country, witnessed by then-US President Bill Clinton, greater than a decade after peace was made with Egypt.

At the same time, artillery fire from southern Lebanon in protest hit targets in northern Israel, with the shelling attributed to Hezbollah, the Lebanese Party of God. Now, 30 years later, Hezbollah dam northern Israel continues in the face of the devastating conflict in Gaza and the escalation of tensions between Israel and Iran. People throughout Jordan feel this manner taken to the streets demanding that King Abdullah tear up the peace agreement.

Jordan has long been seen as a pillar of stability in the Middle East. He is an ally of the US and cooperated with Washington during the War on Terror, while other Arab states were deeply opposed. However, the Hashemite kingdom currently finds itself in a precarious situation.

Since the bombing of Gaza began in October 2023, anti-Israel sentiment has increased dramatically across the Arab world. This anger was felt strongly in Jordan.

The country provided shelter to many Palestinians who were displaced from their ancestral homes in 1948 – an event generally known as the Nakba. And Jordan is now home to estimators 3 tens of millions Palestinians. This means that events in the West Bank and Gaza have reverberations in Jordan.

The pressure is rising

While there have been demonstrations across Jordan since the starting of the Israeli bombing, they’ve intensified in recent weeks. Since March 24, protests have been occurring in the capital of Jordan, Amman (including outside Jordan). Israeli Embassy), in addition to in Karak and Irbid.

The protests began as an expression of support for Hamas and opposition to Israel’s actions in Gaza. But protesters are starting to direct their anger at the Hashemite court, the administrative and political link between the king and the Jordanian state.

They called for an end to the peace agreement, a halt to exports of goods to Israel and a severance of diplomatic relations with Israel. These moves are almost not possible considering Jordan reliance with the help of the US, a key ally of Israel. However, the pressure on the Hashemite court is undoubtedly growing.

Protesters expressed anger over the events in Gaza, in addition to fear that Jordan could be affected by the forced displacement of Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza. These fears will not be groundless, as the events of 1948 show. Perhaps much more disturbing are the Hashemite court accusations by some protesters that the king was “in cahoots” with the Israelis.

Fearing an escalation of the protests, the Jordanian government is trying to limit them. Clashes between protesters and security forces broke out near the Israeli embassy and the Baqaa refugee camp arrestssparking criticism from human rights groups and increasing anger amongst people on the streets.

Pressure on the Jordanian state can be growing from other sources. Funding for the UN aid agency Unrwa has been cut amid allegations that its staff were involved in the October 7 attacks. Jordan has been directly affected as Unrwa provides essential services to over 2 million refugees in the kingdom.

Regional instability

Jordan’s geographic location in the heart of the Middle East means that unrest in the Hashemite kingdom poses a serious challenge to neighboring states, especially Saudi Arabia and Egypt. On April 5, the heir to the throne of Saudi Arabia and de facto ruler, Mohammed bin Salman called King Abdullah and expressed Saudi Arabia’s support for the measures taken by the Government of Jordan to maintain Jordan’s security and stability.”

Regional news outlets have also come out against protesters, portraying them as Iranian or Islamist puppets. Opinion in Al-Arabiya he argued that “Islamist groups want to profit from (ongoing protests in Jordan) … and recreate the revolutions of the Arab Spring.” The Arab Spring was a wave of pro-democracy protests and uprisings that took place across the Middle East and North Africa in 2010 and 2011, difficult some of the region’s entrenched authoritarian regimes.

At Asharq Al-Awsat, former editor-in-chief Tariq Al-Homayed: he suggested that the unrest in Jordan would enable Iran to extend its supply lines to the Mediterranean, giving Iran “a foothold on the border between Saudi Arabia and Egypt.” Another newspaper “Okaz” taken over that the unrest in Jordan was part of “Iran’s project to expand Tehran’s influence” in the Middle East.

This combination of Islamist and Iranian threats could appear counterintuitive given their different political and sectarian characteristics. Islamists similar to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood follow Sunni Islam, while Iran sees itself as a leading Shiite power. However, after the Gaza war began and the contours of regional politics modified, the two camps became increasingly close.

The common anti-Israel stance is where the two sides come together. These were Islamist groups in addition to individuals utilized by some as a means of countering the Shiites and, consequently, Iran’s gains after the 2011 Arab uprisings.

However, in recent years, Islamist groups similar to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood have been watched considered the fundamental threat to internal and regional security from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and other countries due to their long-standing criticism of the rulers in Riyad and Abu Dhabi.

As the Middle East moves away from its eventful days normalization that characterised the spring and summer of 2023, Jordan stays on the precipice. Bringing peace to Gaza is a needed step toward reducing tensions in the Hashemite kingdom, but this alone is probably going to be insufficient.