Imagine: moments after the democratic leader of one of our closest allies lands at Heathrow, he finds himself arrested and handcuffed by British police, awaiting trial and possibly never to see the outside of a jail again.
With Britain duty-bound to its obligations as a founder member of the International Criminal Court (ICC), that astonishing scenario may now be an imminent reality.
It’s difficult to know quite where to begin after the Court’s farcical decision to issue warrants for Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant.
The charges against them are of the gravest nature. They are accused of “crimes against humanity and war crimes”.
The Court claims there are “reasonable grounds” to believe Netanyahu and Gallant “bear criminal responsibility for the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare”.
Already the Israeli president Isaac Herzog has rightly branded the issuing of the warrants an “absurd decision”.
He is using polite diplomacy in choosing such measured words.
I’d call it a scandalous betrayal of the ideals that led to creation of the court in 2002.
Its mission to bring to justice those responsible for “the gravest crimes of concern to the international community” was hailed by former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan as “the cause of all humanity”.
Quite how bringing trumped-up charges against Israel’s leaders furthers that cause escapes me.
Remember, Netanyahu is leading a country that has been locked in an armed struggle for survival against terror groups throughout its entire history.
On October 7, 2023, Israel was subjected to a genocidal attack of unprecedented savagery, in which more than 1,200 men, women and children were murdered in acts of unthinkable cruelty.
In the war that has followed, the IDF have pursued Hamas into Gaza, where terrorist gunmen have used the entire population as one giant human shield.
Tragically, there have been civilian deaths, but these are a consequence of the decision of Hamas to locate their gunmen among families, and to hide their military bases in hospital and schools.
Such casualties are an unavoidable fact of war, but are entirely despite the great efforts to which the IDF has gone to minimise civilian deaths, often putting their own soldiers in harm’s way instead of taking the easy option of using the overwhelming air firepower they have at their disposal.
The only crimes against humanity have been those committed by Hamas, which deliberately sought to kill as many Israelis as possible, and makes no distinction between combatants and civilians.
As for the charge of “starvation as a method of warfare”, even UN officials acknowledge there is no evidence for this absurd fiction.
If there are shortages, they are the result of Hamas and other armed gangs hijacking the convoys carrying abundant supplies into Gaza.
Beyond the details of the charges, in issuing the warrants, the ICC shatters basic principles of international law.
The crucial concept is “complementarity”, which means that the court steps in only when every other route to justice is blocked.
But Israel is a well-functioning democracy with a robustly independent judiciary. Human rights campaigners have successfully brought prosecutions through the courts.
Leading politicians have been put on trial. One prime minster was even jailed.
In fact, I’d say that those in power may well have a greater chance of getting away Scot-free in Britain than Israel.
Of course, Hamas does not put its murderous leaders on trial, and the ICC in its defence will point to the fact that it has also issued a warrant for the arrest of the terror group’s leader Mohammed Deif.
The problem is that Deif is almost certainly dead. The IDF are adamant he was killed in an air raid in Gaza in July. Hamas claim he is still alive, without any evidence.
I suspect the court has issued the warrant only to give the impression of objectivity and balance, in a horrifically misconceived moral equivalence that would seek to put the butchers of Hamas in the same bracket as Israel’s elected leaders.
The terror group’s paymasters Iran must be gleeful as a once respected international institution does their bidding.
Israel is at the frontline of a war against Tehran and its proxy forces, but this is a conflict which threatens the UK and the entire west.
No surprise that the warrants have been seized upon by what remains of Hamas, which today called the ICC decision an “important historical precedent”.
The UK is now at a crossroads. If the Government chooses to enforce these warrants and say it will arrest Netanyahu if he comes here, we are party to a sickening betrayal of Israel.
Or this country can show true moral leadership, declare that these warrants are a hollow mockery of justice and – unthinkable though it once may have been – consider pulling out of the ICC.
The already beleaguered international order will only be further imperilled if we continue to maintain the pretence that this court is still fit for purpose.
History will be unforgiving in its verdict for those who parrot its lies.
Lord Austin served as Labour MP for Dudley North from 2005 – 2019