The Trump administration’s latest sanctions on International Criminal Court officials are not just a diplomatic snub. They are an open declaration that empire and its allies will not be bound by law. By freezing the assets of judges and prosecutors who dared authorise investigations into US personnel in Afghanistan and Israeli leaders over Gaza, Washington makes plain: war crimes are permitted, so long as they are committed by the “indispensable nation” or its favoured client.
Marco Rubio, the new tribune of imperial sovereignty, dresses it up in the language of defence: protecting “our troops, our sovereignty and our allies.” But sovereignty here means nothing more than the right to kill without consequence. The very architecture of international justice (painfully assembled after Nuremberg, falteringly extended to Yugoslavia, Rwanda, and Darfur) is to be bulldozed whenever it threatens the prerogatives of empire. Israel, the perpetual exception, cheers the bulldozer on.
The dialectic is stark. On one side: victims of bombardment, displacement, starvation—millions for whom the ICC’s fragile promise represents the only possibility that their suffering might one day be recognised as a crime rather than an accident of geopolitics. On the other: a coalition of states whose message is clear: might makes right. The US has never joined the ICC, yet insists on vetoing who it may investigate. Israel does the same, all while denouncing any scrutiny as “mendacious smear.”
France issues “dismay.” The UN wrings its hands. But words are not enough. This is not simply about The Hague. It is a direct challenge to Europe, and to Britain in particular. If Starmer’s government recognises Palestine, then recognises the ICC’s warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant, it collides head-on with Trump’s sanctions regime. That is the test. Will Britain stand with international law, or will it crawl behind Washington once more, dressing submission up as “realism”?
Europe too faces the choice. To remain silent is to accept a two-tier system of justice, where African generals and Balkan warlords are dragged before the dock, while Western armies and Israel slaughter with impunity. To resist would mean more than dismay. It would mean actively defending the ICC’s independence, refusing cooperation with US sanctions, and making clear that justice is not an American permission slip.
The sanctions are a confession. Empires know their crimes, and they fear the courtroom. That fear is proof that justice remains possible, but only if the rest of the world refuses to bow.
