By Anthony Deutsch
The escalation of conflict with Iran has led to airstrikes on infrastructure throughout the Middle East and threats, including those made by US President Donald Trump, looming over oil facilities, power plants, and desalination factories that supply the civilian population.
According to some experts, if these actions were carried out, they could constitute war crimes.
WHAT DOES INTERNATIONAL LAW SAY?
The Geneva Conventions of 1949 relating to humanitarian behavior in times of war prohibit attacks on sites deemed essential for civilians: “Under no circumstances shall actions be taken against objects that would risk depriving the civilian population (…) of adequate food or water.”
They explicitly forbid attacks on “vital objects for the survival of the civilian population, such as foodstuffs, agricultural areas intended for the production of foodstuffs, crops, livestock, water installations and reserves, and irrigation works…”
HAVE ARREST WARRANTS BEEN ISSUED FOR ATTACKS ON INFRASTRUCTURE IN OTHER CONFLICTS?
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has cited attacks on critical infrastructure, such as power plants and fuel factories in Ukraine, in the arrest warrants it issued against Russian political and military leaders.
In July 2024, the ICC accused former Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Russian General Valery Gerasimov of war crimes for targeting the Ukrainian power grid in the middle of winter.
Russia has denied the allegations of war crimes and claims to have launched a special military operation in Ukraine in February 2022 in self-defense.
In the ICC arrest warrant targeting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the judges “found reasonable grounds to believe that these two individuals intentionally and knowingly deprived the civilian population of Gaza of essential elements for its survival, including food, water, medicines, medical supplies, as well as fuel and electricity.”
The power outage and reduced fuel supply “had a severe impact on the availability of water in Gaza and on the hospitals’ ability to provide medical care,” the judges concluded. These conditions “led to the deaths of civilians, including children, due to malnutrition and dehydration,” they stated.
Israel also denies the accusations of war crimes and claims to have targeted militants in Gaza and Lebanon in self-defense against an existential threat.
WERE THESE “MILITARY TARGETS”?
The Geneva Conventions and their additional protocols stipulate that parties involved in an armed conflict must distinguish between “civilian objects and military objectives,” and that attacks on civilian objects are prohibited.
This prohibition is also codified in the Rome Statute of the ICC, which is a court of last resort for 125 countries but does not include major powers such as Russia, the United States, and China, as they have not ratified the Rome Statute.
The Geneva Conventions state that certain infrastructure owned and used by civilians may be considered military targets, but only “those goods which, by their nature, location, purpose, or use, make an effective contribution to military action,” and whose destruction or capture “provides a certain military advantage.”
COULD THESE VIOLATIONS BE PROSECUTED?
A case related to the current conflict in the Middle East is unlikely to be brought before a war crimes tribunal in the near future. None of the Gulf states, Israel, or Iran are members of the ICC. There is no other institution with clear jurisdiction over alleged war crimes in the region.
Divisions within the UN Security Council, which can refer cases to The Hague, also make it unlikely that a case related to the conflict will be brought before the Court.
National authorities could gather evidence of alleged war crimes and prosecute them under universal jurisdiction laws, but there are currently no public cases.
(Reporting by Anthony Deutsch; with Stephanie van den Berg, Mara Vilcu for the French version)
