ICC prosecutor who sought to arrest Netanyahu takes leave amid sexual assault charges

The accuser has said that “Khan invoked the court’s investigation of Israel’s war conduct to get her to disavow her allegations,” according to the Wall Street Journal.

By Matthew Xiao, The Washington Free Beacon

International Criminal Court chief prosecutor Karim Khan, who sought an arrest warrant against Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu over Israel’s war against the terrorist group Hamas, announced Friday that he is temporarily stepping down as the United Nations investigates sexual assault allegations against him.

Khan wrote in an email to staff that he will “take leave until the completion of the investigation” into a female aide’s accusations that he coerced her into sexual intercourse on several occasions, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The aide, a Malaysian lawyer in her 30s, says that Khan in 2023 invited her to his hotel room, where he “took her hand and eventually pulled her to the bed,” the Journal reported. “Then he pulled off her pants and forced sexual intercourse, according to the testimony.”

Khan learned of the aide’s accusations last spring.

Two weeks later, in May 2024, he announced he was seeking arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and then-defense minister Yoav Gallant, accusing them of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Israel-Hamas war.

A Washington Free Beacon editorial at the time said that Khan’s move “puts genocidal murderers and their would-be victims on a level moral playing field,” illustrating “the ICC’s moral obscenity and its ignorance of the way democracies have historically responded to existential threats.”

The aide has said that “Khan invoked the court’s investigation of Israel’s war conduct to get her to disavow her allegations,” according to the Journal. Khan has denied the charges.

In November, the ICC formally issued the warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant, marking the first time the U.N.-backed court has issued a warrant for a Western-aligned, democratically elected leader, the Journal noted.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order in early February sanctioning the ICC over its efforts to prosecute Israel and other American allies.

“The ICC consistently constrains liberal, democratic nations like Israel in exercising their rights to self-defense,” a White House fact sheet said at the time, adding that Trump “will not support an organization that unfairly targets U.S. citizens and our allies.”