More chaotic than coherent on Israel: Anthony Albanese under fire on ICC

Anthony Albanese has refused to say whether Australia would enforce International Criminal Court arrest warrants against top Israeli officials, saying he won’t respond to ‘hypotheticals’.

Anthony Albanese in Brisbane on Thursday. Picture: NewsWire/ Glenn Campbell

Anthony Albanese has refused to say whether Australia would ­enforce International Criminal Court arrest warrants against top Israeli officials, while declaring in a chaotic press conference that his government had adopted a “coherent” and “principled” position on the war in Gaza.

The government has for days defended the ICC’s independence after the court’s chief prosecutor, Karim Khan, applied for warrants to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his ­Defence Minister Yoav Gallant and three Hamas terrorists for war crimes and crimes against ­humanity.

Amid condemnation of the move by international leaders ­including Joe Biden, the Prime Minister would not commit to ­enforcing the warrants if they were issued and the Israeli leaders set foot in Australia.

After initially declaring Australia would “make its own decisions”, Mr Albanese said he was not prepared to get ahead of the court. “I’m not about to go into ­hypotheticals about things that have not happened,” he said, amid repeated questions on the matter.

“There’s been an application. There’s been no determination by the ICC against any individual or anybody.”

Asked whether Australia supported the ICC, Mr Albanese declared the question “very broad”.

“The ICC exists. They haven’t made a determination. They haven’t made a decision,” he said.

Mr Albanese, who days earlier refused to comment on the warrants bid at all, said his government supported Israel’s right to defend itself, but “how it defends itself matters”.

The International Criminal Court's chief prosecutor Karim Khan. Picture: AFP

He said there was “no equivalence” between Israel’s actions and those of Hamas, and reiterated the government’s call for the terrorist group to release its ­remaining hostages.

“What we actually need going forward is a coherent position, which is what we have taken. We will continue to do that, take a principled position going forward,” Mr Albanese said.

Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham said Australians deserved a prime minister “who can take and ­defend a position that stands by our democratic values and allies”.

“Mr Albanese has variously squibbed, dodged, been wilfully inconsistent, and ultimately found incapable of explaining a position,” Senator Birmingham said.

“This is a test of how to respond to a terribly difficult issue and the Prime Minister is failing miserably. All he had to do was mirror the clear position taken by (US) President Biden, but Mr Albanese can’t even do that, and can’t or won’t explain why not.”

A day earlier, Peter Dutton ­rejected the prosecutor’s warrants application and declared a future Coalition government could cut ties with the ICC. Cabinet Minister Ed Husic said he was astonished at the prospect of a Coalition boycott of the court.

“The Coalition talks big about law and order but then wants to pick what law and order it’ll follow,” Mr Husic told the ABC. “It’s staggering that you can have a mainstream political party determine – on the basis of something that is uncomfortable to them – that they would then just turn their back on a court of law.”

He accused the Coalition of failing to express concern over the deaths of 35,000 Palestinians in the conflict.

Mr Dutton accused the government of abandoning the nation’s Jewish community, which he said had been left “completely and utterly bewildered” by Labor’s response to the warrants application.

“I think Australians of good faith are bewildered as well that their Prime Minister doesn’t have the ability or the wit to be able to stand up for what is in our country’s best interests and to stand shoulder to shoulder with our allies, including the United States, to condemn an obvious anti-­Semitic act by the ICC,” the ­Opposition Leader said.

The nation’s leading rabbis have implored Mr Albanese to show moral clarity and reject the court’s bid to put Mr Netanyahu on trial. Mr Biden rejected Mr Khan’s warrants application as “obscene”. His Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, flagged US sanctions against the court.

Australia is one of 124 nation states to have ratified the Rome Statute that established the ICC, making it technically obligated to enforce the court’s warrants. ­Neither the US nor Israel is a party to the court.

On Tuesday, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said: “Australia respects the ICC and the important role it has in upholding international law. The decision on whether to issue arrest warrants is a matter for the court in the independent exercise of its functions.”

The Executive Council of Australian Jewry said if the ICC granted the prosecutor’s application, “then those who are named in the arrest warrants will no longer be able to travel to Australia, or any of the 124 countries which are parties to the (court)”.

“This is the first time an ICC prosecutor has requested the ICC to arrest and prosecute the political leaders of a democratic country engaged in a war of self-defence,” ECAJ co-chief executive Peter Wertheim said. “If the (court) agrees … it will set a precedent that may well paralyse democratically elected governments … in defending their countries against future armed attacks by terrorist organisations, and others.”