Penny Wong refuses to condemn ICC over arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu

Penny Wong has left open the prospect that Australia could comply with the order to arrest Benjamin Netanyahu if he were to come to the country – which has disappointed a visiting former Israeli air force chief.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Penny Wong says Labor will be guided by the law rather than politics in its response to the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu, as she left open the prospect that Australia could comply with the order if the Israeli Prime Minister travelled to Australia.

The Foreign Minister batted away questions in the Senate on whether the government agreed with US President Joe Biden’s assessment that the warrant was “outrageous”, accusing the opposition of trying to make political mileage from the situation.

She said unlike the US, Australia was a party to the statute that created the ICC, and the court’s ability to “uphold international law” was in Australia’s national interest.

“Unlike you, we actually believe that adherence to international law is a matter of principle, and it is in Australia’s interests,” Senator Wong said, responding to opposition legal affairs spokeswoman Michaelia Cash.

Asked directly whether the Albanese government would enforce the ICC warrant if Mr Netanyahu ever came to Australia, the Foreign Minister said: “I certainly don’t propose to speculate on hypotheticals.

“What I can say to the ­chamber is that Australia will act consistently with our ­obligations under international law and our approach will be ­informed by international law, not by politics.”

The Executive Council of Australian Jewry’s co-chief executive, Alex Ryvchin, said if Australia was a “real friend” to Israel, Senator Wong would have repudiated the ICC warrant as the US had done.

“The Foreign Minister had an opportunity to demonstrate whether this government is supportive of Israel or hostile to it. The Foreign Minister made her choice,” Mr Ryvchin said.

“I would expect that if an international tribunal grossly exceeding its mandate threatened to arrest our Prime Minister and Defence Minister for leading a just war against terrorists who abducted our citizens, the government of Israel would stand shoulder to shoulder with us.”

The Howard government ratified the Rome Statute that created the ICC in 2002.

But Senator Cash said on the weekend that Australia had “grounds now to reconsider our membership of the organisation”.

The ICC accused Mr Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip, saying they “intentionally and knowingly deprived the civilian population in Gaza of ­objects indispensable to their ­survival, including food, water, and medicine and medical ­supplies, as well as fuel and ­electricity”.

Former Israeli air force chief Eitan Ben Eliyahu told The Australian that Australia’s refusal to stand with Israel and the US in repudiating the warrants was “disappointing”, as they would not help to end the wars in Gaza and Lebanon.

“If you want the war to be ended and you put our leaders in such a position, in fact, what you do is you put more drag on the process,” he said.

Major General Eliyahu, who will speak at the Canberra-Jerusalem Strategic Dialogue this week, said the time had come for Israel to try and bring its wars against Hamas and Hezbollah to an end and turn its attention to Iran.

Retired Israeli Major General Eitan Ben Eliyahu.

He said military action against Iran “should be on the table” ­because “the work there has not been accomplished yet”.

“Everybody in the region is waiting for the next president of the United States. Maybe he will bring in a new atmosphere and new ideas?” Major General Eliyahu said.

He said Israel and the international community also needed to come up with a plan to ensure Gaza was never again controlled by Hamas.

“We have achieved enough in Gaza. The problem is, what will the day after bring?” he said.

As US-brokered ceasefire talks between Israel and Hezbollah inch closer towards an outcome, he said Israel had also achieved its military objectives in Lebanon.

Major General Eliyahu was granted a visa to enter Australia but another speaker due to address Wednesday’s dialogue, former Israeli justice minister Ayelet Shaked, was denied an entry permit on character grounds.

Ms Shaked was told by the Department of Home ­Affairs late on Thursday that her application for a visitor visa had been refused because she could vilify Australians or incite discord.

Major General Eliyahu said the decision was a case of overreach by the government.

“We are not talking about some major figure,” he said.

“Although she used to be a politician, she is not an active politician at that moment. So I think they went too far in order to prevent her from coming.”