The International Criminal Court is a fundamental achievement of the international community that Germany has always supported. Germany respects its independence and the conduct of proceedings just as it does for all other international courts.

In this case, the Pre-Trial Chamber now has to decide on the applications of the Prosecutor for the issuance of arrest warrants as a first step.

The Court will have a host of difficult questions to answer here, including in particular the question as to its jurisdiction and the complementarity of investigations carried out by affected states governed by the rule of law, which include Israel.

The simultaneous applications for arrest warrants for the Hamas leadership on the one hand and the two Israeli officials on the other have resulted in an incorrect implication of equivalence. Nevertheless, the Court will now have two very different situations to assess, as presented in detail by the Prosecutor in his applications.

The Hamas leaders are responsible for a barbaric massacre in which men, women and children were deliberately murdered, raped and kidnapped in the most brutal fashion in Israel on 7 October. Hamas continues to hold Israeli hostages captive in unspeakable conditions, to fire missiles at Israel and use the civilian population in Gaza as human shields.

Protecting and defending its citizens from this is the right and duty of the Israeli Government. It is clear that humanitarian international law applies here with all the obligations contained therein.