Karim Khan of the International Criminal Court: A Thoroughly Disreputable Character

The Chief Prosecutor at the International Criminal Court (ICC), Karim Khan, convinced the court to issue arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for “war crimes.” He is also almost certainly a repeat rapist: “Sexual allegations against Khan spurred Israeli ICC arrest warrants, report suggests,” Times of Israel, May 11, 2025:

Khan, through his lawyers, told the newspaper that it is “categorically untrue that he has engaged in sexual misconduct of any kind.”

Hmm. Do you believe Karim Khan, or the woman who, to her excruciating embarrassment, felt compelled to report him after many episodes of rape, and the promise of more to come if she remained silent about it? She chose the only way she could to put a stop to it.

The newspaper said that just two and a half weeks after Khan learned of the allegations, on May 20, 2024, he announced his intention to issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant over the war in Gaza, in addition to Hamas leaders. The day before, he had canceled a fact-finding mission to Israel and Gaza …

According to the Journal, Alan Dershowitz had been organizing a meeting that was set to take place during the trip between Khan and Netanyahu.

Lawyers for Khan denied any connection between the allegations and the warrants….

Really? No connection? A meeting was being organized between Netanyahu and Karim Khan, where in Jerusalem he would hear the prime minister’s response to the charges being contemplated. Khan had said his visit to Israel and Gaza would be “important in making his decision.” Yet he suddenly cancelled the trip, did not reschedule it, and promptly announced, the very day after his trip was to have taken place, his intention to seek arrest warrants for both Netanyahu and Gallant, without having given either of them the chance to present to him their side of the story. The only thing that had happened to explain that cancellation and Karim Khan’s rush to judgement was the charge of rape brought against him by his former employee, a charge not yet made public.

Khan is a thoroughly disreputable character. Not only did he rape this woman repeatedly, but he blackmailed her into staying silent by saying her charges would undermine him, and thus his case against the Israelis. And he also, it seems, retaliated against other staff members who reported the allegations or were critical of him. Were they demoted, or fired, or had their salaries reduced? That is a whole other line of inquiry, in the case of the ICC v. Karim Khan, KC. Clearly Karim Khan would stop at nothing, would use any weapon, to keep his position, his salary, and his reputation. Let us hope he now loses all three.

Khan has alleged that the accusations against him were part of an effort to undermine the ICC. The Journal report said that court officials were concerned that the Mossad was operating at The Hague. No further details were given….

So now we are going to blame the Mossad? Did those Mossad agents — you know, they are everywhere, even at the ICC — force him to repeatedly rape his assistant in order to make him look bad? Did Mossad push him to issue his arrest warrants when he did, immediately after news of the rape charges became known? Of course, Karim Khan can say, “I am completely innocent of these charges. The government of Israel, through its secret agents working for Mossad, was tasked with destroying my reputation. Hence these charges that are absurd, as anyone who knows me can testify, I am a happily married man and do not go around raping members of my staff.”

So now we know the rest of the story. Karim Khan is a rapist and an extortionist (his victim kept her job in return for submitting to his insensate lust). He played on his assistant’s desperate need to stay employed to force her to accommodate his needs. He went swanning around the globe with her, a mobile mistress taken by him to luxury hotels paid for by the ICC.

To shut her up, he told her that any damage to his reputation would undermine his pursuing his arrest warrants against those terrible Israelis. And he wanted to make sure that the media focused on the arrest warrants and not be distracted by salacious gossip about Karim Khan which, of course, he would forcefully deny.

Forcefully, but not convincingly. He’s in a lot of trouble now, and he should not only lose his job as chief prosecutor but should also be removed from the ICC’s staff. And if convicted of rape, he will likely, of course, be struck off. He might even end up in Wormwood Scrubs. But when he comes out, whenever that is, a job is sure to be waiting for him at Al Jazeera. He can be their legal correspondent.