The plane carrying Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Florida for talks with U.S. President Donald Trump passed through the airspace of three countries that are parties to the International Criminal Court, despite an active ICC arrest warrant against the Israeli leader.
Flight tracking data from FlightRadar24 showed Netanyahu’s aircraft, known as “Wings of Zion,” crossed the airspace of Greece, Italy and France before reaching the Atlantic Ocean.
All three countries are signatories to the Rome Statute, which obliges member states to cooperate with ICC arrest warrants.
What would the countries be supposed to do? Let’s ignore politics. I’m a small law-abiding country, I’m a member of the ICC. Let’s also assume that I’m aware of the warrant and have knowledge about the flight path and the passengers.
Now what? Shall I politely ask them to land in The Hague? Should I use force? Risk starting a war?
The only realistic option I see is to diplomatically request to use a different route. Or maybe make it so that I can pretend I was not informed.
Yes landing the plane with force is literally the law.
Or even easier, don’t give it flight space access. Flight space access is granted on request. Planes don’t just simply show up above an airspace and hope to not get shot down. It’s all with permission.
Yes. You scrample fighter jets and force them down, using missiles if necessary.
This does not follow. The war would be started by whoever illegally retaliated for a lawful arrest, not by whoever did the arresting.
The semantics of who “is to blame” for the war are ultimately irrelevant to the small nation trying to avoid being in a war.
Yes, the small nations of France and Italy
Obviously size is relative in situations like this, and compared to Israel+US France and Italy are indeed small
Yes, you have air traffic control command them to land. If they don’t, you escort them down with jet fighters. All that has occurred here is the ICC has shown that warrants can be situationally worthless.
Yes, you risk starting a war if you arrest a war criminal. That sucks. But that doesn’t mean you ignore the warrant for fear of consequence. Now our fucking idiot president here gets a huge, very unneeded ego injection knowing European powers are afraid to arrest criminals going to speak to a convicted felon.
Europe is America’s bitch. Always has been.
Israel is an American colony in the middle East.
Joe Biden once said if Israel didn’t exist, we’d have to invent one.
America has to fall for this genocide to end. There’s just too much money involved in this colony. There’s middle eastern oil which will be under the Greater Israel control, they will also control the Suez canal.
I’m American and I agree that nothing short of a catastrophic collapse is going to solve our own problems domestically, as well as put a stop to the laundry list of horrors we commit abroad.
Are you European or American?
Netanyahu did not show up at the border unannounced saying “let me through or else”. He got permission ahead of time. Had he not gotten permission, he would have had to find another country who did or gone around. Especially for Greece and Italy which don’t really stand in his way, the Mediterranean is right there!
Even assuming that Netanyahu calls the bluff and flies through, there are a lot of options ahead of all-out war. For instance sending jets to “intercept” his plane and escort him out saying “he refused to follow orders to land and we did not deem it worth it to escalate the situation”. It’s not like his airliner is armed or anything. But it would send a very different diplomatic message.
For France in particular, this is far from the first time he flies over its territory unimpeded. This is not a matter of military concerns, this is pro-Israel Macron taking a stance to show support for his ally. He’s not been very outspoken on Gaza because the domestic political situation is very delicate and anything he says can only weaken his support further, but his personal stance is hardly a secret and the military interceptors are under his full control.
Yes you can tell them you will arrest them if they fly over. And you should start a war.
Not sure what the point of joining the ICU if you don’t want to hold the laws.
Start a war? Part of the point of joining international organizations is to stop war from reoccurring so for you to casually suggest starting a war is to come from a completely unserious position.
You’re part of an international organisation. The other country is not part of that organisation. The countries in your international organisation would come to defend you.
Also France is no “small country”
Until the leaders of countries, and all those seeking that same power fear to misuse that power, war will be a natural state of our species.
Sure, you might have to start a small war or two, but eventually people will get the point that their leaders need to be held accountable by the people of those countries, or other countries will hold them to account.
Without any of that, we end up exactly right where we are, where leaders and countries can get away with genocide, completely invalidating any power those global institutions are supposed to wield.
The war would be started by whoever illegally retaliated for a lawful arrest, not by whoever did the arresting.
How do you arrest one person on a plane flying through the air?
You intercept with fighter jets and give them one last chance to land. That’s not my opinion, that’s literally how it works.
And if they don’t…? It’s a nice idea, but do you think they’re going to shoot down a plane with other people on it and everything will just be fine?
I don’t think anyone being above the law is just fine either.
My point was I don’t think there would be any real consequences if they didn’t land and obviously shooting them down would cause a lot more problems. For the record, I dont think either are ok, I just think that’s the reality of the situation.
You point missiles at em and shoot if needed
You withdraw fron icc. France and italy are in the nato, israel is not idiotic to start a war with the west