The Israeli prime minister’s office said Israel “utterly rejects the false and absurd charges of the International Criminal Court”.
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not give in to pressure. He will continue to pursue all the objectives that Israel set out to achieve in its just war against Hamas and the Iranian axis of terror,” it added.
There was no immediate reaction from Gallant – who was sacked as defence minister early this month.
But in May he strongly rejected the ICC prosecutor’s arrest warrant requests, saying they had drawn a “despicable” parallel between Israel and Hamas and had attempted to deny his country’s right to self-defence.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog called the chamber’s decision “outrageous”, and said the ICC had “turned universal justice into a universal laughing stock”.
“The decision has chosen the side of terror and evil over democracy and freedom, and turned the very system of justice into a human shield for Hamas’ crimes against humanity,” he added.
Hamas welcomed the warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant, saying that it “constitutes an important historical precedent, and a correction to a long path of historical injustice against our people”.
It also called on countries around the world to enforce the warrants and work to stop what it called “the crimes of genocide against defenceless civilians in the Gaza Strip”.
Israel has vehemently denied that its forces are committing genocide against Palestinian in Gaza.
Human Rights Watch said the warrants for the three men “break through the perception that certain individuals are beyond the reach of the law”.
“Whether the ICC can effectively deliver on its mandate will depend on governments’ willingness to support justice no matter where abuses are committed and by whom,” said Balkees Jarrah, the campaign group’s associate international justice director.
A White House National Security Council spokesperson said the US “fundamentally rejects” the court’s decision.
“We remain deeply concerned by the prosecutor’s rush to seek arrest warrants and the troubling process errors that led to this decision,” a White House National Security Council spokesperson said.
“The United States has been clear that the ICC does not have jurisdiction over this matter. In co-ordination with partners, including Israel, we are discussing next steps.”
However, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said it was “not a political decision”.
“The decision of the court has to be respected and implemented,” he added, noting that it was binding on all EU member states.
Netanyahu’s most recent overseas trip was to the US in July. Last year, he visited several other countries, including the UK.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
