The court in The Hague (ICC) announced on Thursday it would act on the recommendation of prosecutor Karim Khan to issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu, Gallant and Hamas leader Mohammed Deif, who is dead according to the IDF.

Israeli politicians at all levels condemn ICC warrants. "The decision marks a dark day for justice and humanity,” stated today the President of Israel, Isaac Herzog. “Taken in bad faith, the outrageous decision at the ICC has turned universal justice into a universal laughingstock. It makes a mockery of the sacrifice of all those who fight for justice – from the Allied victory over the Nazis till today,” the president declares.

Amir Ohana, speaker of the Knesset, wrote: “Targeting the democratically elected leaders of Israel, the Middle East’s only democracy and the world’s only Jewish state, is nothing short of an assault on justice, truth and the universal right of self-defense.”

In turn, Benjamin Netanyahu noted that "the antisemitic decision of the International Criminal Court is a modern Dreyfus trial—and will end the same way".

The Prime Minister gabinet stated that "the decision to issue an arrest warrant against the prime minister was made by a corrupt chief prosecutor who is trying to save himself from sexual harassment accusations and biased judges who are motivated by antisemitic hatred of Israel. The ICC prosecutor lied when he told American senators that he would take no action until he had visited Israel and heard its side. Instead, he canceled his arrival in Israel last May, several days after suspicions of sexual harassment were made against him, and announced his intention to issue arrest warrants against the prime minister and former defense minister."

Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar said the warrants mean that the ICC has “lost all legitimacy for its existence and activity,” as “it acted as a political instrument wielded by the most radical forces working to undermine peace, security and stability in the Middle East.” The warrants are “in fact an attack on Israel’s right to defend itself,” he wrote, calling on “all decent countries and people” to reject them.

Education Minister Yoav Kisch wrote that the decision “will deter neither us nor the State of Israel from striking its enemies without hesitation until a total victory. Israel utterly rejects the false and absurd charges of the International Criminal Court, a biased and discriminatory political body. No war is more just than the war Israel has been waging in Gaza since October 7th, 2023, when the Hamas terrorist organization launched a murderous assault and perpetrated the largest massacre against the Jewish people since the Holocaust."

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir wrote that Israel’s response to the arrest warrants should be annexing “all the territories of Judea and Samaria; establishing settlements in all parts of the country and severing all ties with the Palestinian Authority, as well as applying sanctions against it.”

Opposition Leader Yair Lapid, a harsh critic of Netanyahu, tweeted: “ These arrest warrants are a prize for terrorism. Israel is defending its existence from terrorist groups that attacked, murdered and raped out citizens.”

Benny Gantz, another prominent opposition leader, called the ICC’s decision “moral blindness and a shameful stain of historic proportions that will never be forgotten.”

Yair Golan, the leader of the Democrats Party—perhaps the most left-of-center of the Zionist political parties in Israel—wrote that the decision was “shameful,” adding: “Israel has always had and will always have the right to defend itself from our enemies.”

Former prime minister Naftali Bennett, a right-wing critic of Netanyahu, wrote: “Israel is fighting … the most just of wars against pure evil. All Israelis, left and right, stand behind the war, whose goals are to release the kidnapped Israelis, demolish Hamas and restore security to Israel. Shame on ICC.”

Avigdor Liberman, another right-wing critic of Netanyahu and who served under him as foreign minister, said the decision “reflects the double morals and hypocrisy of the international community and the United Nations.”

Israel, the United States and Russia are among the dozens of countries that have not signed the ICC charter and are therefore not subject to its rulings. However, countries that are, including E.U. member states are bound by the charter to enforce its rulings and arrest warrants.