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Bensouda, former chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and currently Gambia’s High Commissioner to the UK, described 17 years at the ICC, including eight years as deputy prosecutor and nine years as chief prosecutor, during which she faced intimidation, pressure, and threats related to the ICC’s investigations into war crimes, genocide, crimes against humanity, and the crime of aggression. She said this work “triggers pushback” against the court.
She stated that in 2015, after opening an examination into Palestine, she began receiving threats involving both herself and her family. She described an early incident in The Hague when she was still living there: two men visited her house in a car parked not next to the residence. She said she did not know where they were from. The driver took the car’s number plate, and she eventually came out while the men stood outside and did not enter. She said they handed her an envelope containing about $500 and told her it was from someone she had helped, which she interpreted as showing they knew where she lived. She reported the incident to ICC security and to the registrar, returned the money, and submitted the number plate. She said the only established detail was that the phone numbers provided were from Israel. She also said Dutch authorities did not do more investigation “as far as I know.”
She said Israel made her feel insecure and that this was the first clear Israeli attempt she knew of to persuade her to stop the Palestine investigations. She referenced other security-related incidents around the time, including someone caught near her house taking photos, and the broader context that she had also requested investigations into the US military regarding Afghanistan war crimes, and that Kenya and Côte d’Ivoire cases were still ongoing.
Bensouda said she later met Yossi Cohen, the head of Mossad at the time. She described meeting him first in Munich and again in a hotel in New York during the UN General Assembly period, where she was meeting a head of state. She said Cohen approached and the meeting concerned the Palestine investigations. She said Cohen indicated that they did not want the Palestine investigations to continue and that she should stop. She portrayed the progression of the message as initially friendly and attempts to win her over, then increasingly direct: she said Cohen repeatedly insisted that she stop the investigations and that this was the “bottom line.”
She said she responded by keeping it quiet and reporting to ICC security and informing Dutch authorities, while avoiding alarming general ICC staff to prevent panic and protect the work. She said she was not aware of extra support from the Dutch government beyond reporting. She also said some authorities urged her to stop because she could be harmed or killed, but she said stopping was “out of the question” to her.
She argued that state parties established the ICC have a responsibility to protect and insulate the court from attacks and to ensure personnel feel protected, but that they were not doing enough, and that justice was being sacrificed to political interests.
Bensouda said that in 2019 she announced the investigation in the Palestine case and that soon afterward the United States imposed stiff sanctions. She said the sanctions affected her daily life beyond travel, including blocking her bank account at the UN Federal Credit Union and disrupting simple transactions such as booking hotels and transferring money. She said the ICC registrar, working with Dutch authorities, managed for banks to accept to receive her salary, but she said other banks associated with her, including her mortgage bank, closed down. She also said her son’s account in the Gambia was blocked, and that efforts were made to investigate her husband through photographs and audio recordings to determine whether he was involved in anything illegal.
She said the threats and sanctions had an impact on the ICC’s work, noting that even measures taken to keep cases moving cannot fully prevent disruption. She concluded that states should come together with structures that act immediately when attacks happen, instead of waiting and scrambling afterward, and that they do not speak with “the same voice,” with some states refusing to help.