Albanese urges ICC arrest warrants for Israeli ministers over torture of Palestinians
Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, presents her latest report before delegates at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, on 23 March 2026
Sondos Asem reports in Middle East Eye on 24 March 2026:
The UN’s special rapporteur on Palestine, Francesca Albanese, has called on the International Criminal Court (ICC) to pursue arrest warrants for three Israeli ministers she accuses of being responsible for “systematic torture” amounting to genocide.
In a new report presented to the UN Human Rights Council on Monday, Albanese names National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and Defence Minister Israel Katz as the primary political figures involved in shaping policies that enabled the torture of Palestinians after 7 October 2023.
Last year, Middle East Eye reported that the ICC’s chief prosecutor, Karim Khan, had prepared arrest warrant applications against Ben Gvir and Smotrich on apartheid charges before he went on leave in May. But the warrants have yet to be filed by the deputy prosecutors, who are in charge of Khan’s office in his absence, due to the ongoing threat of US sanctions.
“While the dehumanisation of the Palestinians predates the appointments of Itamar Ben-Gvir, Bezalel Smotrich and Israel Katz in the government, these politicians now preside over, and give political direction to, the policies behind the present report’s findings,” Albanese says in her report.
“Any credible pursuit of justice must confront torture not as an isolated crime, but as a foundational pillar of a genocidal project aimed at the complete erasure – physical and psychological destruction, displacement and replacement – of the Palestinian people.”
Albanese’s report says that both custodial practices inside prisons and detention centres and broader conditions imposed on Palestinians since the Hamas-led attack of October 2023 amount to forms of torture under international law.
The report concludes that these acts meet the legal threshold for genocide, particularly under provisions relating to the infliction of serious bodily or mental harm on a protected group.