The Pathetic Hypocricy of Israel and USA on Palestinian ICC Plans to Probe War Crimes in Gaza

I've touched before on the hypocritical attitude of the USA regarding the activities – or lack of activities – of the International Criminal Court, ICC with regard to international conflicts: here and here. In that case, the conflict in question pertained to Syria. Now, a few days ago, there were news of an official visit of the foreign minister of the Palestinian Authority, Riad al-Malki, to the ICC prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, where the former urged the ICC to probe alleged war crimes of Israeli soldiers, IDF high officers, state officials and politicians during the recent and ongoing attacks in Gaza, to date resulting in around 2 000 dead, among which are many civilians and children, many more injured and material destruction of vast proportions (here, here, here). 

Related to past Israeli attacks on Gaza, such petitions have ended in nothing, as the ICC have found the legal status of the Palestinian Authority to be uncertain. It has been commented that, in order for the ICC to move on this issue, the PA needs become a member of the ICC, and only states can be such members (here). However, in 2012, the UN general assembly voted with a large majority to recognise the PA as a de facto state, albeit not a UN member (here, here, here). This is now used as a stepping stone by the PA to move for membership of the ICC (see also here) – to sign the Rome statute – thus recognising the court's authority, becoming party to its actions and be bounded by its decisions. To quote a report from Reuters (linked to above): 

If the Palestinians were to sign the ICC's founding treaty, the Rome Statute, the court would have jurisdiction over crimes committed in the Palestinian territories.
With Palestinian authorization, an ICC investigation could then examine events as far back as July 1, 2002, when the court opened with a mandate to try individuals for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.

Of course, what such probes and possible prosecutions against Israelis would lead to is entirely up to the prosecutors and judges of the court. For a number of reasons, one of which is about evidence, it may end up in nothing. However, it must be observed that any such probe might also uncover war crimes committed by the PA or the Hamas-controlled Gaza leadership, their officers, officials, politicians and soldiers. For instance, the rocket-fire of the Hamas military contingent, The Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, towards Israeli civilian areas may very well constitute such crimes. Crimes such as genocide are namely not defined by the sheer number of victims, but by the intent behind prosecuted actions (here). In other words, by joining the ICC, the PA opens itself up to allegations and convictions and has bounded itself to comply, including the handing over of any Palestinian wanted for questioning or arrest.

Now, this is certainly not the case regarding Israel or its politicians or personnel and neither is it true of the USA. Both these states stand in the proud company of China, Iraq, Libya, Yemen and Qatar not to recognise the ICC and to have refused signing the Rome statute – in fact, USA has even (under G.W Bush) actively withdrawn a previous signature of then US president Bill Clinton (for sources see my former post). Nevertheless, responding to the move of the PA towards ICC, Israeli PM, Benjamin Netanyahu, has officially asked the US to help Israel to avoid ICC actions (see also here and here) and a White House representative has responded that the US will support the Israeli case in this respect. These attitudes of both Israel and the USA are not only hypocritical – if they want to have a say over the ICC, they should join it and recognise it – it is pathetically so. Both of them wants to eat the cake and have it, to get the goods without paying the price.

Exactly how pathetic these moves by the Israels state and the US are is revealed by Netanyahu's stated concern of Israel being held to a "double standard" visavis Hamas. As just described, it is in fact Israel's persistent refusal to join and recognise the ICC which creates a double standard – in Israel's favour. For while the PA moves to join, thus empowering ICC to probe and prosecute actions on its territories and charge and arrest its citizens, Israel is not (and neither is the USA). As long as Israel reserves this (doubtful) legal privilege, it is Netanyahu and the state that he is currently running that actively upholds a double standard towards all those states realising the value and import of solid international law instruments pertaining to war crimes and crimes against humanity and recognising the ICC – among them, should they join, the state of Palestine, represented by the PA.

In conclusion, if Israel and the USA really wants to work for an adequately functioning ICC and secure lack of double standard in its actions, they should both immediately sign the Rome statute and recognise the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. Then, there would be some clout behind their present claims.

Update: Facebook Experiments Lacked Support in User Agreement and May Have Included Minors

I posted yesterday about the ethical and possibly legal ramifications of the already infamous emotional manipulation experiment where researchers tweaked Facebook user feeds and studied ensuing user behaviour. The post yesterday gave links to a number of useful accounts and analyses, but I did also mention my own doubt that the research, including the subsequent publication of the findings, was covered by the Facebook user agreement. Today, Kashmir Hill at Forbes reveals that this is exactly what was the case. Not only did the user agreement not include "research", however, apparently Facebook realised what this meant for the defensibility of the study and retrospectively added "research" to the agreed to activities by users after the study's data collection in January 2012. In addition, it is also revealed that the study inclusion criteria did not exclude minors, and since Facebook allow users down to the age of 13, this means that the researchers may very well have been children without their or their parents' consent.

Both of these revelations are, of course, of substantial importance for the research ethical assessment of the study. Not least is the combination rather damaging not only for Facebook and its study leader Adam Kramer, but also for the non-Facebook employed researchers Jamie Guillory and Jeffrey Hancock. This since it may be assumed that the research ethical assessment that was allegedly performed at their universities, Cornell and the University of California, rested, at least partly, on the presumption of consent being implied by the Facebook user agreement. Moreover, this point is especially sensitive because of the possible enrollment of children, as research ethics standards, regardless of area, is especially adamant on rigorous consent procedures and protection mechanisms for children, as it is for other vulnerable groups, and mandatory involvement of their parents or guardians in one way or another, especially when they are below 15 years of age. Possibly, dirt may therefore spill over also on the journal PNAS's responsible editor Susan T. Fiske of Princeton University, whose responsibility it was to ensure the ethical soundness of the article before publication.

That's ethics. But, of course, today's revelation also means that there may be basis for substantial legal complaints. Not least, since Facebook and the involved universities are based in the USA – the heaven of civil lawsuits for astronomical amounts of money – it seems far from improbable that users who where included in the study may join in a class-action suit against (primarily) Facebook and the involved universities. Whether or not there would be grounds for administrative of criminal legal action is more difficult to assess, as I lack knowledge of sufficient details of the relevant sections of US law.

Facebook Emotional Manipulation Experiment: A Collection of Readings

I will not make a real post of my own re the already infamous experiments (initially claimed to be military funded, but that, it seems, was a hoax), where Facebook allowed behavioural researchers to manipulate the allocation of status updates in personal feeds, to study the resulting emotional communicative behaviour of users. My own brief take is that, whatever else may be said on the matter, this is definitely not covered by the user agreement I've signed when joining Facebook. For while I did agree to Facebook testing out all sort of things to improve their service, I did certainly not agree to be a subject in a scientific research experiment, the result of which is published in a scientific journal. I also think that the study may harbour some substantive both methodological and research ethical difficulties, spilling over to not only Facebook, but also the prestigeous PNAS journal's editors, who seem to have taken proof of research ethical review rather lightly... But don't take my word for it, here are four selected sources, not all echoing my views exactly, which may help you make up your mind.

The first one simply set up what the whole thing is about in broad terms, providing a few useful links. The second discusses the scientific quality of the study, which is also important from a research ethics standpoint. The third is an account by a usually brilliant bioethics and research ethics law scholar, discussing the legal ramifications of the study, as well as details regarding what has and should have happened in procedural terms. The fourth is a purely research ethical account by a trusted bioethics colleague of mine. Enjoy!

1. Meyer, R: Everything We Know About Facebook's Secret Mood Manipulation Experiment, from The Atlantic.

2. Grohol, JM: Emotional Contagion on Facebook? More Like Bad Research Methods, from PsychCentral.

3. Meyer, MN: Everything You Need to Know About Facebook’s Controversial Emotion Experiment, from Wired.

4. Hunter, D: Consent and Ethics in Facebook’s Emotional Manipulation Study, from The Conversation.