Britain provides Israel military chief ‘special’ diplomatic immunity during visit to UK

Britain provided special diplomatic immunity to Israel’s military chief Herzi Halevi to enable him to visit the United Kingdom last month without the risk of arrest, the government has revealed. In late November, Israel’s Chief of the General Staff, Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi, made a visit to the UK to discuss “the ongoing conflicts in Lebanon and Gaza” with senior British officials from the Ministry of Defence and the Foreign Office, as well with the UK’s Attorney General Richard Hermer.

The top Israeli military official’s visit took place only days after the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant over their role in war crimes in Gaza, with Halevi – who has directed the Israeli occupation forces’ operations during the ongoing genocide – having initially been another figure set to be subject to an arrest warrant.

Although no arrest warrant was issued against him, British authorities could still have potentially arrested him via private arrest applications that can be issued under universal jurisdiction legislation – an avenue through which authorities can pursue and prosecute serious crimes, such as war crimes, regardless of where they were committed. London was revealed to have obstructed that possibility, however, with the Foreign Office this week responding to a parliamentary question from Labour MP Brian Leishman by admitting that it “gave consent for special mission status for the visit to the UK on 24-25 November of Lieutenant General Herzl Halevi… and [his] delegation”.

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