Iran’s supreme leader has called for the execution of Benjamin Netanyahu in the wake of the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) arrest warrant for the Israeli prime minister.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei declared on Monday that “an arrest warrant for Netanyahu is not enough – he should be sentenced to execution” over alleged war crimes.
Addressing a group of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps generals and Basij militia forces in Tehran, he said: “This is a war crime – the enemy has not achieved victory in Gaza or Lebanon. Bombing civilians’ homes in Gaza and Lebanon is not a victory.”
Attendees at the gathering chanted: “Death to America”, “Death to Israel” and “Death to England”.
Khamenei said: “The fools should not think that just because they bomb people’s homes, hospitals, and communities, they have won. No, nobody considers this a victory.”
Recently, the ICC accused Mr Netanyahu, along with Yoav Gallant, his former defence minister, and Mohammed Deif, a Hamas commander, of war crimes and crimes against humanity over the Israel-Gaza conflict.
It means Mr Netanyahu and Mr Gallant are now at risk of being arrested in any of the 124 countries who are members of The Hague-based court.
Israel claimed Deif was killed in an air strike in Gaza in July, but the ICC could not confirm this and issued its arrest warrant.
Britain has said it respects the court and ministers have refused to say if Mr Netanyahu would be arrested if he came to the UK. Germany signalled it would not detain him because of its Nazi past and special relationship with Israel, despite being a member of the ICC.
Viktor Orban, the prime minister of Hungary, pledged to defy the order to arrest Mr Netanyahu and instead invited him on a state visit.
As well as calling for the death penalty for Mr Netanyahu, Khamenei also claimed that Iran’s proxies across the Middle East, including Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen, were growing in strength, vowing to “destroy” Israel.
“Today, the resistance front is expanding, and tomorrow, this expansion will multiply several times,” he said, despite Israeli assassinations of senior terror leaders in recent months and reports that Israel and Hezbollah are nearing a possible ceasefire.
Although risking possible reprisals for their posts, Iranians on social media criticised Mr Khamenei’s “thirst for execution”.
One user of X, formerly Twitter, posted: “How disgusting is this perspective that [he] only knows the language of execution.” Another said: “Who will order your execution sentence?”
In October, at least 166 people were hanged in Iran, the highest monthly figure in over 20 years, according to the Iran Human Rights organisation.
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