![\"Karim](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/5c06848d1949d9bd8a778e9f6e7f09ca1f93ecc3\/0_146_4000_2400\/master\/4000.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none\")
<\/a>Bensouda, who as chief prosecutor opened the ICC\u2019s investigation in 2021, paving the way for last week\u2019s announcement, was also spied on and allegedly threatened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Netanyahu has taken a close interest in the intelligence operations against the ICC, and was described by one intelligence source as being \u201cobsessed\u201d with intercepts about the case. Overseen by his national security advisers, the efforts involved the domestic spy agency, the Shin Bet, as well as the military\u2019s intelligence directorate, Aman, and cyber-intelligence division, Unit 8200. Intelligence gleaned from intercepts was, sources said, disseminated to government ministries of justice, foreign affairs and strategic affairs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A covert operation against Bensouda,\u00a0revealed on Tuesday by the Guardian, was run personally by Netanyahu\u2019s close ally Yossi Cohen, who was at the time the director of Israel\u2019s foreign intelligence agency, the Mossad. At one stage, the spy chief even enlisted the help of the then president of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Joseph Kabila.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Details of Israel\u2019s nine-year campaign to thwart the ICC\u2019s inquiry have been uncovered by the Guardian, an Israeli-Palestinian publication +972 Magazine and Local Call, a Hebrew-language outlet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The joint investigation draws on interviews with more than two dozen current and former Israeli intelligence officers and government officials, senior ICC figures, diplomats and lawyers familiar with the ICC case and Israel\u2019s efforts to undermine it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Contacted by the Guardian, a spokesperson for the ICC said it was aware of \u201cproactive intelligence-gathering activities being undertaken by a number of national agencies hostile towards the court\u201d. They said the ICC was continually implementing countermeasures against such activity, and that \u201cnone of the recent attacks against it by national intelligence agencies\u201d had penetrated the court\u2019s core evidence holdings, which had remained secure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A spokesperson for Israel\u2019s prime minister\u2019s office said: \u201cThe questions forwarded to us are replete with many false and unfounded allegations meant to hurt the state of Israel.\u201d A military spokesperson added: \u201cThe IDF [Israel Defense Forces] did not and does not conduct surveillance or other intelligence operations against the ICC.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Since it was established in 2002, the ICC has served as a permanent court of last resort for the prosecution of individuals accused of some of the world\u2019s worst atrocities. It has\u00a0charged the former Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir, the late\u00a0Libyan president Muammar Gaddafi\u00a0and most recently, the\u00a0Russian president, Vladimir Putin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Khan\u2019s decision to seek warrants against Netanyahu and his defence minister, Yoav Gallant, along with Hamas leaders implicated in the 7 October attack, marks the first time an ICC prosecutor has sought arrest warrants against the leader of a close western ally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity that Khan has levelled against Netanyahu and Gallant all relate to Israel\u2019s eight-month war in\u00a0Gaza, which according to the territory\u2019s health authority has killed more than 35,000 people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But the ICC case has been a decade in the making, inching forward amid rising alarm among Israeli officials at the possibility of arrest warrants, which would prevent those accused from travelling to any of the court\u2019s 124 member states for fear of arrest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is this spectre of prosecutions in The Hague that one former Israeli intelligence official said had led the \u201centire military and political establishment\u201d to regard the counteroffensive against the ICC \u201cas a war that had to be waged, and one that Israel needed to be defended against. It was described in military terms.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n That \u201cwar\u201d commenced in January 2015, when it was confirmed\u00a0that Palestine would join the courtafter it was recognised as a state by the UN general assembly. Its accession was condemned by Israeli officials as a form of \u201cdiplomatic terrorism\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One former defence official familiar with Israel\u2019s counter-ICC effort said joining the court had been \u201cperceived as the crossing of a red line\u201d and \u201cperhaps the most aggressive\u201d diplomatic move taken by the Palestinian Authority, which governs the West Bank. \u201cTo be recognised as a state in the UN is nice,\u201d they added. \u201cBut the ICC is a mechanism with teeth.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n For Fatou Bensouda, a respected Gambian lawyer who was elected the ICC\u2019s chief prosecutor in 2012, the accession of Palestine to the court brought with it a momentous decision. Under the Rome statute, the treaty that established the court, the ICC can exercise its jurisdiction only over crimes within member states or by nationals of those states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Israel, like the US, Russia and China, is not a member. After Palestine\u2019s acceptance as an ICC member, any alleged war crimes \u2013 committed by those of any nationality \u2013 in occupied\u00a0Palestinian territories\u00a0now fell under Bensouda\u2019s jurisdiction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On 16 January 2015, within weeks of Palestine joining, Bensouda\u00a0opened a preliminary examination\u00a0into what in the legalese of the court was called \u201cthe situation in Palestine\u201d. The following month, two men who had managed to obtain the prosecutor\u2019s private address turned up at her home in The Hague.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sources familiar with the incident said the men declined to identify themselves when they arrived, but said they wanted to hand-deliver a letter to Bensouda on behalf of an unknown German woman who wanted to thank her. The envelope contained hundreds of dollars in cash and a note with an Israeli phone number.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sources with knowledge of an ICC review into the incident said that while it was not possible to identify the men, or fully establish their motives, it was concluded that Israel was likely to be signalling to the prosecutor that it knew where she lived. The ICC reported the incident to Dutch authorities and put in place additional security, installing CCTV cameras at her home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The ICC\u2019s preliminary inquiry in the Palestinian territories was one of several such fact-finding exercises the court was undertaking at the time, as a precursor to a possible full investigation. Bensouda\u2019s caseload also included nine full investigations, including into events in DRC, Kenya and the Darfur region of Sudan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Officials in the prosecutor\u2019s office believed the court was vulnerable to espionage activity and introduced countersurveillance measures to protect their confidential inquiries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In Israel, the prime minister\u2019s national security council (NSC) had mobilised a response involving its intelligence agencies. Netanyahu and some of the generals and spy chiefs who authorised the operation had a personal stake in its outcome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Unlike the\u00a0international court of justice\u00a0(ICJ), a UN body that deals with the legal responsibility of nation states, the ICC is a criminal court that prosecutes individuals, targeting those deemed most responsible for atrocities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Multiple Israeli sources said the leadership of the IDF wanted military intelligence to join the effort, which was being led by other spy agencies, to ensure senior officers could be protected from charges. \u201cWe were told that senior officers are afraid to accept positions in the West Bank because they are afraid of being prosecuted in The Hague,\u201d one source recalled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Two intelligence officials involved in procuring intercepts about the ICC said the prime minister\u2019s office took a keen interest in their work. Netanyahu\u2019s office, one said, would send \u201careas of interests\u201d and \u201cinstructions\u201d in relation to the monitoring of court officials. Another described the prime minister as \u201cobsessed\u201d with intercepts shedding light on the activities of the ICC.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Five sources familiar with Israel\u2019s intelligence activities said it routinely spied on the phone calls made by Bensouda and her staff with Palestinians. Blocked by Israel from accessing Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, the ICC was forced to conduct much of its research by telephone, which made it more susceptible to surveillance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thanks to their comprehensive access to Palestinian telecoms infrastructure, the sources said, intelligence operatives could capture the calls without installing spyware on the ICC official\u2019s devices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIf Fatou Bensouda spoke to any person in the West Bank or Gaza, then that phone call would enter [intercept] systems,\u201d one source said. Another said there was no hesitation internally over spying on the prosecutor, adding: \u201cWith Bensouda, she\u2019s black and African, so who cares?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The surveillance system did not capture calls between ICC officials and anyone outside Palestine. However, multiple sources said the system required the active selection of the overseas phone numbers of ICC officials whose calls Israeli intelligence agencies decided to listen to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to one Israeli source, a large whiteboard in an Israeli intelligence department contained the names of about 60 people under surveillance \u2013 half of them Palestinians and half from other countries, including UN officials and ICC personnel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In The Hague, Bensouda and her senior staff were alerted by security advisers and via diplomatic channels that Israel was monitoring their work. A former senior ICC official recalled: \u201cWe were made aware they were trying to get information on where we were with the preliminary examination.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Officials also became aware of specific threats against a prominent Palestinian NGO, Al-Haq, which was one of several Palestinian human rights groups that frequently submitted information to the ICC inquiry, often in lengthy documents detailing incidents it wanted the prosecutor to consider. The Palestinian Authority submitted similar dossiers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Such documents often contained sensitive information such as testimony from potential witnesses. Al-Haq\u2019s submissions are also understood to have linked specific allegations of Rome statute crimes to senior officials, including chiefs of the IDF, directors of the Shin Bet, and defence ministers such as Benny Gantz.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Years later, after the ICC had opened a full investigation into the Palestine case, Gantz designated Al-Haq and five other Palestinian rights groups as\u00a0\u201cterrorist organisations\u201d, a label that was\u00a0rejected\u00a0by multiple European states and later\u00a0found by the CIA to be unsupported by evidence. The organisations said the designations were a \u201ctargeted assault\u201d against those most actively engaging with the ICC.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to multiple current and former intelligence officials, military cyber-offensive teams and the Shin Bet both systematically monitored the employees of Palestinian NGOs and the Palestinian Authority who were engaging with the ICC. Two intelligence sources described how Israeli operatives hacked into the emails of Al-Haq and other groups communicating with Bensouda\u2019s office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One of the sources said the Shin Bet even installed Pegasus spyware, developed by the private-sector NSO Group, on the phones of multiple Palestinian NGO employees, as well as two senior Palestinian Authority officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Keeping tabs on the Palestinian submissions to the ICC\u2019s inquiry was viewed as part of the Shin Bet\u2019s mandate, but some army officials were concerned that spying on a foreign civilian entity crossed a line, as it had little to do with military operations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt has nothing to do with Hamas, it has nothing to do with stability in the West Bank,\u201d one military source said of the ICC surveillance. Another added: \u201cWe used our resources to spy on Fatou Bensouda \u2013 this isn\u2019t something legitimate to do as military intelligence.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Legitimate or otherwise, the surveillance of the ICC and Palestinians making the case for prosecutions against Israelis provided the Israeli government with an advantage in a secret back channel it had opened with the prosecutor\u2019s office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Israel\u2019s meetings with the ICC were highly sensitive: if made public, they had the potential to undermine the government\u2019s official position that it did not recognise the court\u2019s authority.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to six sources familiar with the meetings, they consisted of a delegation of top government lawyers and diplomats who travelled to The Hague. Two of the sources said the meetings were authorised by Netanyahu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Israeli delegation was drawn from the justice ministry, foreign ministry and the military advocate general\u2019s office. The meetings took place between 2017 and 2019, and were led by the prominent Israeli lawyer and diplomat Tal Becker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn the beginning it was tense,\u201d recalled a former ICC official. \u201cWe would get into details of specific incidents. We\u2019d say: \u2018We\u2019re receiving allegations about these attacks, these killings,\u2019 and they would provide us with information.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n A person with direct knowledge of Israel\u2019s preparation for the back-channel meetings said officials in the justice ministry were furnished with intelligence that had been gleaned from Israeli surveillance intercepts before delegations arrived at The Hague. \u201cThe lawyers who dealt with the issue at the justice ministry had a big thirst for intelligence information,\u201d they said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For the Israelis, the back-channel meetings, while sensitive, presented a unique opportunity to directly present legal arguments challenging the prosecutor\u2019s jurisdiction over the Palestinian territories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They also sought to convince the prosecutor that, despite the Israeli military\u2019s\u00a0highly questionable record of investigating wrongdoing in its ranks, it had robust procedures for holding its armed forces to account.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This was a critical issue for Israel. A core ICC principle, known as complementarity, prevents the prosecutor from investigating or trying individuals if they are the subject of credible state-level investigations or criminal proceedings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Israeli surveillance operatives were asked to find out which specific incidents might form part of a future ICC prosecution, multiple sources said, in order to enable Israeli investigative bodies to \u201copen investigations retroactively\u201d in the same cases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIf materials were transferred to the ICC, we had to understand exactly what they were, to ensure that the IDF investigated them independently and sufficiently so that they could claim complementarity,\u201d one source explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Israel\u2019s back-channel meetings with the ICC ended in December 2019, when Bensouda,\u00a0announcing the end of her preliminary examination, said she believed there was a \u201creasonable basis\u201d to conclude that Israel and Palestinian armed groups had both committed war crimes in the occupied territories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was a significant setback for Israel\u2019s leaders, although it could have been worse. In a move that some in the government regarded as a partial vindication of Israel\u2019s lobbying efforts, Bensouda stopped short of launching a formal investigation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Instead, she announced she would ask a panel of ICC judges to rule on the contentious question of the court\u2019s jurisdiction over the Palestinian territories, due to \u201cunique and highly contested legal and factual issues\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yet Bensouda had made clear she was minded to open a full investigation if the judges gave her the green light. It was against this backdrop that Israel ramped up its campaign against the ICC and turned to its top spy chief to turn up the heat on Bensouda personally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Between late 2019 and early 2021, as the pre-trial chamber considered the jurisdictional questions, the director of the Mossad, Yossi Cohen, intensified his efforts to persuade Bensouda not to proceed with the investigation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cohen\u2019s contacts with Bensouda \u2013 which were described to the Guardian by four people familiar with the prosecutor\u2019s contemporaneous accounts of the interactions, as well as sources briefed on the Mossad operation \u2013 had begun several years earlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In one of the earliest encounters, Cohen surprised Bensouda when he made an unexpected appearance at an official meeting the prosecutor was holding with the then DRC president, Joseph Kabila, in a New York hotel suite.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sources familiar with the meeting said that after Bensouda\u2019s staff were asked to leave the room, the director of the Mossad suddenly appeared from behind a door in a carefully choreographed \u201cambush\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After the incident in New York, Cohen persisted in contacting the prosecutor, turning up unannounced and subjecting her to unwanted calls. While initially amicable, the sources said, Cohen\u2019s behaviour became increasingly threatening and intimidating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A close ally of Netanyahu at the time, Cohen was a veteran Mossad spymaster and had gained a reputation within the service as a skilled recruiter of agents with experience cultivating high-level officials in foreign governments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Accounts of his secret meetings with Bensouda paint a picture in which he sought to \u201cbuild a relationship\u201d with the prosecutor as he attempted to dissuade her from pursuing an investigation that, if it went ahead, could embroil senior Israeli officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Three sources briefed on Cohen\u2019s activities said they understood the spy chief had tried to recruit Bensouda into complying with Israel\u2019s demands during the period in which she was waiting for a ruling from the pre-trial chamber.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They said he became more threatening after he began to realise the prosecutor would not be persuaded to abandon the investigation. At one stage, Cohen is said to have made comments about Bensouda\u2019s security and thinly veiled threats about the consequences for her career if she proceeded. Contacted by the Guardian, Cohen and Kabila did not respond to requests for comment. Bensouda declined to comment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When she was prosecutor, Bensouda formally disclosed her encounters with Cohen to a small group within the ICC, with the intention of putting on record her belief that she had been \u201cpersonally threatened\u201d, sources familiar with the disclosures said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After the incident in New York, Cohen persisted in contacting the prosecutor, turning up unannounced and subjecting her to unwanted calls. While initially amicable, the sources said, Cohen\u2019s behaviour became increasingly threatening and intimidating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A close ally of Netanyahu at the time, Cohen was a veteran Mossad spymaster and had gained a reputation within the service as a skilled recruiter of agents with experience cultivating high-level officials in foreign governments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Accounts of his secret meetings with Bensouda paint a picture in which he sought to \u201cbuild a relationship\u201d with the prosecutor as he attempted to dissuade her from pursuing an investigation that, if it went ahead, could embroil senior Israeli officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Three sources briefed on Cohen\u2019s activities said they understood the spy chief had tried to recruit Bensouda into complying with Israel\u2019s demands during the period in which she was waiting for a ruling from the pre-trial chamber.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They said he became more threatening after he began to realise the prosecutor would not be persuaded to abandon the investigation. At one stage, Cohen is said to have made comments about Bensouda\u2019s security and thinly veiled threats about the consequences for her career if she proceeded. Contacted by the Guardian, Cohen and Kabila did not respond to requests for comment. Bensouda declined to comment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When she was prosecutor, Bensouda formally disclosed her encounters with Cohen to a small group within the ICC, with the intention of putting on record her belief that she had been \u201cpersonally threatened\u201d, sources familiar with the disclosures said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fearing US armed forces would be prosecuted, the\u00a0Trump administration\u00a0was engaged in its own aggressive campaign against the ICC, culminating in the summer of 2020 with the imposition of US economic sanctions on Bensouda and one of her top officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Among ICC officials, the US-led financial and visa restrictions on court personnel were believed to relate as much to the Palestine investigation as to the Afghanistan case. Two former ICC officials said senior Israeli officials had expressly indicated to them that Israel and the US were working together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At a press conference in June that year, senior Trump administration figures signalled their intention to\u00a0impose sanctions on ICC officials, announcing they had received unspecified information about \u201cfinancial corruption and malfeasance at the highest levels of the office of the prosecutor\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As well as referring to the Afghanistan case, Mike Pompeo, Trump\u2019s secretary of state, linked the US measures to the Palestine case. \u201cIt\u2019s clear the ICC is only putting Israel in [its] crosshairs for nakedly political purposes,\u201d he said. Months later,\u00a0Pompeo accused Bensouda\u00a0of having \u201cengaged in corrupt acts for her personal benefit\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The US has never publicly provided any information to substantiate that charge, and Joe Biden\u00a0li<\/a>fted the sanctions\u00a0months after he entered the White House.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But at the time Bensouda faced increasing pressure from an apparently concerted effort behind the scenes by the two powerful allies. As a Gambian national, she did not enjoy the political protection that other ICC colleagues from western countries had by virtue of their citizenship. A former ICC source said this left her \u201cvulnerable and isolated\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cohen\u2019s activities, sources said, were particularly concerning for the prosecutor and led her to fear for her personal safety. When the pre-trial chamber finally\u00a0confirmed the ICC had jurisdiction in Palestinein February 2021, some at the ICC even believed Bensouda should leave the final decision to open a full investigation to her successor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On 3 March, however, months before the end of her nine-year term, Bensouda\u00a0announced a full investigation\u00a0in the Palestine case, setting in motion a process that could lead to criminal charges, though she cautioned the next phase could take time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAny investigation undertaken by the office will be conducted independently, impartially and objectively, without fear or favour,\u201d she said. \u201cTo both Palestinian and Israeli victims and affected communities, we urge patience.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n source:theguardian <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" When the chief prosecutor of the international criminal court (ICC) announced he was\u00a0seeking arrest warrants\u00a0against Israeli and Hamas leaders, he issued a cryptic warning: \u201cI insist that all attempts to impede, intimidate or improperly influence the officials of this court must cease immediately.\u201d Karim Khan did not provide specific details of attempts to interfere in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":42840,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_post_source_name":"","_post_source_url":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[4836,11261,4342,4899,11264,11830,8217,6975,183,5304,11394,1546,7358,2701,2784,5178,6573,10387,12758,7960,7331,9784,9194,8256,5145,8023,7460,596,1384,10507,6197,12326,10391,913,8041,12246,5663,5846,9309,597,10339,6778,7704,9505,12310,8057,9127,11638,3577,2629,2264,9385,8697,8100,5930,12634,10840,13036,5908,12957,8995,10954,11211,11280,10197,3095,6057,2471,7519,10419,1063,9515,10776,3874,9974,11001,9833,12309,1765,5572,6864,1141,7693,286,990,8486,7968,12454,422,8637,5568,6821,5243,7039,11375,3805,3174,11167,71,5506,3457,5217,5713,5655,5752,7422,11279,6988,6730,7333,10841,7931,9151,7609,11581,13182,5465,1687,9262,6348,9539,5647,694,5251,5761,8869,5570,6571,2982,5273,10415,36,594],"class_list":["post-42839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-news","tag-access","tag-accused","tag-afghanistan","tag-african","tag-allegations","tag-armed-forces","tag-army","tag-arrest","tag-assault","tag-attack","tag-attacks","tag-baba","tag-bank","tag-behaviour","tag-bet","tag-biden","tag-black","tag-campaign","tag-captured","tag-case","tag-cash","tag-charged","tag-charges","tag-chiefs","tag-cia","tag-citizenship","tag-cohen","tag-congo","tag-corruption","tag-court","tag-cyber","tag-decade","tag-declined","tag-democratic","tag-diplomat","tag-diplomatic","tag-diplomats","tag-displaced","tag-dollars","tag-drc","tag-dutch","tag-engaged","tag-espionage","tag-european","tag-exercise","tag-fear","tag-february","tag-forced","tag-future","tag-gaza","tag-government","tag-hacked","tag-hacking","tag-hague","tag-hamas","tag-health","tag-human-rights","tag-humanity","tag-icc","tag-idf","tag-infrastructure","tag-international","tag-international-criminal-court","tag-intimadation","tag-investigation","tag-israel","tag-jerusalem","tag-joe-biden","tag-judges","tag-justice","tag-kenya","tag-killed","tag-lawyer","tag-lead","tag-leadership","tag-mahmoud-abbas","tag-meeting","tag-men","tag-mike-pompeo","tag-military","tag-ministers","tag-muammar-gaddafi","tag-national-security","tag-netherlands","tag-new-york","tag-nice","tag-nine","tag-obsessed","tag-offence","tag-palestine","tag-palestinian","tag-palestinians","tag-pegasus","tag-phone","tag-phones","tag-president","tag-prime-minister","tag-prosecution","tag-putin","tag-rome","tag-russia","tag-russian","tag-sanctions","tag-security","tag-security-council","tag-spy","tag-spying","tag-successor","tag-sudan","tag-summer","tag-surveillance","tag-territories","tag-terrorism","tag-terrorist","tag-trial","tag-trump-administration","tag-un","tag-un-general-assembly","tag-united-states","tag-us","tag-victims","tag-visa","tag-vladimir-putin","tag-war","tag-war-crimes","tag-water","tag-west-bank","tag-white","tag-white-house","tag-woman","tag-work","tag-world","tag-who"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42839"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42839\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42841,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42839\/revisions\/42841"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Displaced](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/3f16e2cf5dc402a4434d724cc9b89dabef917b86\/0_0_4713_2828\/master\/4713.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none\")
<\/a>![\"Mahmoud](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/05933d047699b16aa01489e11a170a1ee3b86638\/0_158_3046_1828\/master\/3046.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none\")
<\/a>A hand-delivered threat<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Fatou](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/a43ff9902b6c6d6125f6dfaf081ccc1c0f2631a6\/0_366_8640_5184\/master\/8640.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none\")
<\/a>![\"Facade](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/a7fad69cd96d53bc0591c32de5c20aa54fc90c56\/0_0_5472_3283\/master\/5472.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none\")
<\/a>Hacked emails and monitored calls<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Photo](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/e60831f66baa67b088d66ac4e4a4890396b3153e\/0_296_5500_3300\/master\/5500.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none\")
<\/a>Secret meetings with the ICC<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Tal](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/5be9fb8f0bf17c9c8011bf7f0856d52f4261d129\/0_177_4250_2549\/master\/4250.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none\")
<\/a>![\"Bensouda](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/34e5d4aff086a95ec45f349e53f7917f883f7ea8\/0_237_6000_3600\/master\/6000.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none\")
<\/a>Personal threats and a \u2018smear campaign\u2019<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Joseph](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/b59f23bd376fdfa4ad2b64590a8849b11dda3050\/0_94_3500_2100\/master\/3500.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none\")
<\/a>![\"Yossi](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/e1f0e8510fb52724cf48947b69ee706005a57051\/0_258_6014_3608\/master\/6014.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none\")
<\/a><\/a>![\"Mike](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/521019e9af03d27d44beafc6d372c1cb3cbfa076\/0_134_6405_3845\/master\/6405.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none\")
<\/a>