Peloni: The mask is falling, but the charade of Justice from the illicit ICC was never in doubt. This evil institution has no interest in justice, does not practice equality before the law, and extends its reach well beyond its authorized jurisdictions. Israel should shun this corrupt institution, give it no weight of recognition on the international stage, and the US should do the same. More than this, the US sanctioning of the ICC and its members is the only justice which might be sought from such an illegal, unlawaful, and corrupt organization.
By | July 18, 2026
Karim Khan, UN International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, Creative Commons Attribution 2.0
Karim Khan is an International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor. The ICC has temporarily suspended him while the charges against him, of pressuring a member of his staff to engage in nonconsensual sexual touching — its exact extent has not been made public — with him, and of misusing ICC funds that were spent on that staff member’s first-class travel so that she could accompany him on his travels around the world, can be investigated. That’s not the end of his troubles. The British regulators of lawyers in the UK have just extended their previous barring of Khan from practicing in the UK, that began last June, pending the ICC’s final decision in Khan’s case. More on the latest woes for Karim Khan can be found here: “UK Upholds ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan’s Suspension Over Sexual Misconduct Allegations,” by Ailin Vilches Arguello, Algemeiner, July 15, 2026:
British authorities have upheld a suspension barring International Criminal Court (ICC) Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan from practicing law in the United Kingdom, the country’s Bar Standards Board announced Tuesday, as the embattled prosecutor remains under investigation over sexual misconduct allegations.
The regulator for lawyers in England and Wales first suspended Khan in June — a step it said is reserved for “very serious and urgent cases” — and extended the ban this week after a hearing, pending the outcome of the disciplinary case. The 56-year-old, who has denied wrongdoing, has been at the center of the scandal for more than two years over allegations brought by a former female aide.
Khan is calling his former aide a liar, denying her allegations of sexual misconduct, but the ICC’s oversight body, having investigated her charges, concluded that Khan had engaged in “serious sexual misconduct.” It urged that the ICC member states consider removing Khan from his job as the ICC’s senior prosecutor.
His fate now rests with the ICC’s oversight body, the Assembly of States Parties, which will hold a special session on July 24 at United Nations headquarters in New York. The body’s executive committee recently concluded that Khan had engaged in serious misconduct and urged member states to consider removing him from office.
According to an Associated Press investigation, Khan moved the woman — who had worked in another ICC department — into his office, after which she became a regular presence on official trips. Whistleblower documents allege that on one foreign trip he asked her to rest with him on a hotel bed and sexually touched her, and cite other nonconsensual incidents in his office….
In Nov. 2024, the ICC issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu, his former defense minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas military chief Mohammed Deif — since killed by Israel — over alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza. The court said there were reasonable grounds to believe Netanyahu and Gallant bore criminal responsibility for starvation and the persecution of Palestinians, charges Israel vehemently denies….
Yes, nothing says “starvation” in Gaza like the 1.8 million tons of food that the Israelis have brought into the Strip just between October 2025 and June 2026. At the same time, Israel has supplied Gaza with 70,000 cubic meters of water each day through pipelines, desalination facilities, and other infrastructure.
The timing of Karim Khan’s preposterous charges against Israel deserves to be noted. He first learned on May 2, 2024 about the charges of sexual misconduct that were going to be made against him. The scandalous charge was, he knew, soon to be made public, but before it was, Khan on May 24 made public his own recommendation to the Court that it issue warrants for “war crimes” against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. The Israelis believe that Khan hoped that by making such sensational charges against Israel, he would divert public attention from his own scandal. Furthermore, Karim Khan knew that his bringing charges against Netanyahu and Gallant would win him support from Israel-haters around the world, including countries whose nationals serve as judges on the ICC.
All parties to the Rome Statute — the 1998 treaty that established the ICC — are obligated to arrest Netanyahu should he enter their territory. But several member states, among them Hungary, France, Poland, and Italy, have signaled they would not do so.
That shows that a number of important countries are willing to ignore Karim Khan’s charge of “war crimes” because they find his evidence flimsy.
Karim Khan is unlikely to be brought back as prosecutor for the ICC; nor will he be allowed to practice law in the UK. The “sexual misconduct” charges against him clearly convinced the ICC that he be suspended as the Court’s senior prosecutor, and nothing has come to light since then that would exonerate him. The ICC also doesn’t dare keep him on, because that would enrage the United States, at a time when the ICC’s very existence is being challenged in Washington.
The United States, as Secretary of State Marco Rubio has just said, intends with its allies to “dismantle the ICC.” The State Department’s campaign includes imposing sanctions on ICC judges and prosecutors, revoking visas, issuing travel bans, and pressuring nations that rely on U.S. aid to reject the court’s authority. Though many in the American government, both Democrats and Republicans, have long been severely critical of the ICC, the push against the Court became much more vigorous after the ICC, following the recommendation of Khan, issued arrest warrants for Israeli leaders and sought to investigate U.S. military conduct abroad, especially in Afghanistan. With Khan gone, the ICC may try to persuade Washington that it will no longer try to prosecute nationals of states that have not accepted its jurisdiction. Judging by Secretary Rubio’s stern rhetoric against the Court, it’s going to be a hard sell.
Of course this is just politics!
Why a Karim Khan, why not a Bobby Jones????