On 3 April 2012, the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an update on its preliminary examination of the situation in Palestine. This preliminary examination was initiated after the Palestinian Authority (PA) submitted a declaration to the ICC in January 2009, in the aftermath of the 22-day conflict in Gaza and southern Israel, to determine whether the ICC could open an investigation into crimes committed during that conflict. The Office of the Prosecutor concluded that it is unable to proceed with investigating and prosecuting these crimes unless the relevant United Nations bodies (in particular, the Secretary General and General Assembly) or the ICC Assembly of States Parties (made up of 121 states that have ratified the Rome Statute of the ICC (Rome Statute) decide that Palestine qualifies as a state for the purpose of acceding to the Rome Statute (see: http://www.icc-cpi.int/NR/rdonlyres/C6162BBFFEB9-4FAF-AFA9-836106D2694A/284387/SituationinPalestine030412ENG.pdf ).
In response, Amnesty International issued a press release (copied at the end of this document) criticizing the decision and arguing that the Prosecutor should instead seek a judicial ruling on the issue from the ICC’s Pre-Trial Chamber.
Full Report - 4 pages
http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/MDE15/018/2012/en/a6cf21da-8cdc-4913-9972-c9e6b30b7491/mde150182012en.pdf
Ali Abunimah: How the rules were broken to deny justice to Israel’s victims in Gaza http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/icc-was-hoax-start-how-rules-were-broken-deny-justice-israels-victims-gaza
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