The Israeli government decided to approve a request by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to make all discussions about a recent statement by the International Criminal Court saying that the court wants to investigate Israel for war crimes confidential, according to section 35 of Israel’s Basic Law. Section 35 states that “debates and decisions of the Government and those of the Ministerial committees regarding” certain matters “are secret and their disclosure and publication is prohibited.” The Basic Law allows for the government to implement section 45 on “matters regarding which the Government deems secrecy to be essential to the State, a notification thereof having been declared in an order, for the purposes of this law” and matters “that the Government has decided to keep secret; the disclosure and publication of such matters is forbidden only to persons who were aware of the decision.” The discussions about the ICC statement will be held within the security cabinet. A special discussion will be held this afternoon at the Foreign Ministry. The ICC intends to open a war crimes investigation into Israeli and Palestinian actions in Gaza, east Jerusalem and the West Bank beginning from June 13, 2014. If the case moves to the trial stage, then the court could issue arrest warrants against high-level Israelis and Palestinians. Tovah Lazaroff contributed to this report.
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