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Opinion: The upside of the ICC’s decision to target Israel

In the eyes of the ICC judges, when Israelis say enough is enough and start defending themselves, it’s a “war crime.”

By Jack Engelhard, Arutz Sheva

So while Israeli politicians were busy taking sides for the upcoming election, even changing sides and trading insults, something else happened.

From the Hague came word that the International Criminal Court (ICC) intended to go ahead with plans to probe Israel for “war crimes” during the 2014 Gaza War.

That’s when the IDF guys had to go neighborhood to neighborhood, house to house, to face off against Palestinian Arab terrorists who were hiding themselves and their weapons and ammo inside homes, schools and mosques…and dared anyone to come in and try their luck on so much territory trip wired and booby-trapped. Sixty-seven Israeli soldiers were not lucky.

Some 500 were wounded.

Operation Protective Edge was Israel’s answer to the barrage of Hamas rockets that terrorized Israel daily.

So in the eyes of the ICC judges, when the Israelis say enough is enough and start defending themselves, it’s a war crime…or war crimes that merit scrutiny.

News of this came from out of nowhere. The ICC, which has no jurisdiction over Israel (nor the United States), is not a group that people think about too much.

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It’s not the kind of thing where people here or in Israel greet each other and, rather than talk baseball, ask, “Any word from the ICC lately?”

Or, rather than basketball, “Any news on what the ICC is up to these days?”

Or, “It’s so quiet from the Hague lately. I wonder what’s on tap.”

Well, now we know…and if you ask me, good timing.

A swift kick in the pants is what this is…a reminder that in your political cocoon you may be Left, Right, Forever-Bibi, Never-Bibi, but to places in the wider world you are JEWISH.

That’s all they know. That is all they care about…and not with kindness, necessarily.

I’ll take a chance to suggest that even radical leftists are not happy with the ICC. They too have kids in the IDF.
As in the Hague, for example…which dropped this bombshell weeks before the March 23 elections, as if to add spice to the political squabbling underway.

Yet it appears that Political Israelis have sensibly retreated to their corners and declared a semi time-out in consideration of this threat from outside.

I’ll take a chance to suggest that even radical leftists are not happy with the ICC. They too have kids in the IDF.

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Birds do it, bees do it, people do it…we bicker within, but when a hostile outsider steps in, we close ranks…and woe to the intruder.

Up until a few days ago, the politicians had the stage on which they could call attention to the other guy’s failures…the other party’s shortcomings…and do so with rage and gusto.

You would think there is no other business.

But yes there is, after a voice is heard from the Hague, targeting all the people, regardless of party affiliation.

Jewish…that’s your party.

We all know the story, that when we forget we are Jews, someone always comes along to remind us…and hopefully to reunite us.

Thank you, ICC.

Jack Engelhard wrote the worldwide book-to-movie bestseller “Indecent Proposal,” among other successful books. He writes frequently on topics related to the Jews and Israel.