The International Criminal Court has rejected an attempt by the Palestinians to have Palestine recognized as a state legally capable of referring cases to the court in The Hague for its consideration. The decision effectively halts an attempt by the Palestinian Authority to have the ICC prosecutor investigate the 2008-2009 three-week bombardment of Gaza by the Israelis. Even as the dust from the last Israeli shell settled, the Palestinians announced their unilateral recognition of the ICC. It has taken the court three years to decide it would not accept the Palestinian move. Unfortunately for the court's reputation, there is a whiff of sulphur around the decision and a strong suspicion that the ICC has had its arm twisted by the United States. This in itself is something of a scandal, since Washington has refused to recognize the ICC, for fear in part, that it could find itself facing charges brought by other countries. Yet it may be possible to work out why the ICC was prepared to sidestep the enormity of the Gaza bombardment, which brought widespread international revulsion and condemnation. There is a bigger prize on offer, which is final US recognition of the court. Since November 2009, the Americans have been attending administrative meetings of the ICC as observers. In 2010, Obama sent a high-level team to a review meeting of the ICC founding Rome Statute. Then in February 2011 at the UN Security Council, the Americans voted in favor of Resolution 1970, which referred the human rights situation in Libya to the ICC. This was the very first time the United States had produced, in the view of some observers, a de facto recognition of the court. Has the Obama administration held out the probability that if it wins a second term, it will join the ICC and in doing so transform the court's standing? If this is so, the court has been prepared to sacrifice the objective investigation of an appalling atrocity. The Gaza bombardment saw 1,400 Palestinians, mainly civilians, slaughtered in an onslaught, the savagery of which dwarfed the Assad regime's shelling of the Syrian city of Homs, which Washington has found so repugnant. Amnesty International is claiming political pressure was exerted on the court to reject the Palestinians, whose statehood is recognized by 130 other countries and even some UN bodies. It is hard to disagree. But perhaps the bitterest element of the ICC's decision is the way it has been welcomed so warmly by the Israelis, the people who stand accused of the brutal three-week siege of Gaza. They have applauded the rejection and congratulated the ICC on its wisdom. This is sickening hypocrisy from the Netanyahu government. If the ICC's judgement is so good and its wisdom so great, why is it that the Israelis have refused to have anything to do with the court? Does Israel really imagine it can get away with murder if it refuses to allow the international community to pass formal judgement ? __
