“In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

On May 20, 2024, the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court issued a statement requesting the Pre-Trial Chamber of the Court to issue arrest warrants for war criminals “Benjamin Netanyahu” and “Yoav Gallant,” as well as three senior leaders of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), namely the brother fighter Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the movement, the brother fighter Yahya Sinwar, the head of the movement in the Gaza Strip, and the brother fighter Mohammed Deif, the Commander in Chief of the Resistance.

“In light of this statement issued by the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, we in the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) are preparing a comprehensive legal memorandum to respond to all the false accusations contained therein. The movement affirms the following:

Firstly: The Prosecutor’s statement was full of inaccuracies and errors, showing bias towards the occupation state, which practices genocide against our people in the Gaza Strip, in addition to the crimes of the occupation army and settler gangs in the West Bank and occupied Al-Quds.

Secondly: The Prosecutor began his steps by sympathizing with “israeli” victims and their families, visiting and listening to them in their settlements, while showing no sympathy for our people, who continue to suffer from genocide, blockade, and starvation. The number of martyrs and wounded so far exceeds 120,000 civilians, in addition to the destruction of more than 70 percent of the buildings and institutions in the Gaza Strip, particularly targeting the health and education sectors.

Thirdly: The Prosecutor erred in considering that the zionist entity has the right to self-defense like other states, forgetting that the primary crime from which all tragedies originate is the occupation, which is a crime according to international norms and laws.
Here, we reiterate that it is the right and duty of our people to resist the occupation by all possible means, including armed resistance, a fact recognized by international laws but overlooked by the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court.

Fourthly: The Prosecutor also erred in considering that the history of the conflict began on October 7, disregarding more than 76 years of occupation and massacres suffered by our people. We remind the Prosecutor that the occupation has imposed a deadly blockade on the Gaza Strip since 2006.
The occupation has launched four devastating wars against our people in the Gaza Strip over the past years. Therefore, the UN Secretary-General stated that “the events of October 7 did not occur in a vacuum.”
In this context, we confirm that the Prosecutor obtained his information about the events of October 7 from the misleading “israeli” media sources that lack professionalism and credibility.

Fifthly: The Prosecutor believed the “israeli” claims of a plan for systematic sexual assaults, yet the occupation could not provide a single piece of evidence. It is appalling that the Prosecutor repeated these accusations and attributed them to the movement’s leadership, along with the occupation’s false claims of torture, genocide, and other lies!

Sixthly: The Prosecutor’s bias was glaring when he directed accusations and requested an arrest warrant for the head of the movement, a political figure living outside Gaza who has suffered greatly like all our people, with the criminal occupation targeting and killing his sons and grandchildren. Meanwhile, the Prosecutor ignored directing any accusations against the “israeli” Chief of Staff, who orders all operations of killing, destruction, and genocide, and repeatedly appears in the field!”