State Attorney Amit Aisman recently recommended investigating Likud Knesset Member Keti Shitrit on suspicion of incitement to violence against residents of Gaza, Kan news reported on Monday.
The report came on the heels of others earlier this week that Aisman had sought investigations into singers Eyal Golan and Kobi Peretz for inflammatory comments against Gazans.
According to Kan, Aisman eyed incitement charges against Shitrit over comments she made in an interview a few weeks after Hamas’s October 7 attack, when thousands of terrorists invaded southern Israel from the Gaza Strip, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages, and starting the ongoing war.
“If you ask me personally, not as a member of the Knesset,” Shitrit told Channel 14 then, “I’d flatten Gaza. I have no sentimental feelings about it, because there’s no separating the murderers of women and children from the citizens of Gaza.”
Aisman’s office said in a statement on Monday that some months ago, as Israel faced pressure at the International Court of Justice, the state attorney had looked into launching incitement probes into several public figures, but eventually decided against it.
The statement did not name specific people, but according to Kan news, Shitrit, Peretz, and Golan were all “on the same list.”
Golan, a pop superstar in Israel whose wartime anthem “Am Yisrael Chai” topped the charts in the early months of the war, called to “erase Gaza” days after the Hamas attacks, saying “not one person should be left there.”
Peretz, another popular singer, wrote on Instagram in March that he was booted from an Israeli military base after saying, during a performance for soldiers there, “Let their village burn,” (a popular refrain amid extremists referring to Arab villages) and “Gaza should burn.”
It was previously reported that Aisman had recommended an investigation into National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, over similarly inflammatory statements. The far-right minister voiced his support for Golan on social media following the report earlier this week that the singer had been eyed for charges.
Investigations into Ben Gvir or Shitrit could be complicated by the partial immunity granted to ministers and members of Knesset.
The International Court of Justice in The Hague has been considering a case brought by South Africa in December, in which the plaintiffs accuse Israel of violating the Genocide Convention over the course of the war against Hamas in Gaza.
Israel is accused, among other things, of failing to prevent or punish incitement to genocide, an obligation stipulated by the convention, of which Israel is a signatory.
In a statement on Monday, the State Attorney’s Office invoked these accusations in response to the reports about potential incitement investigations:
“Against the backdrop of claims made against the State of Israel as part of the proceedings at the International Court of Justice in The Hague and other forums, including [accusations] that Israel is not acting in accordance with international law, and that the Israel Defense Forces must be stopped from fighting, the state attorney was asked to prepare a legal brief on statements by individuals holding office and others who have influence in Israel,” the statement said, noting that “such remarks came up in court discussions in The Hague.”
“The legal report was sent several months ago to the attorney general in preparation for a discussion to be held in The Hague,” Aisman’s office continued. But “in accordance with a decision by the state attorney, we will not open criminal investigations on this matter.
“That decision was made prior to the reports published about the topic in recent days,” the statement noted.
In addition to the proceedings against Israel in the International Court of Justice, which tries nations, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant also face potential charges at the International Criminal Court, which prosecutes individuals.
The court’s authority to prosecute Israelis, already disputed given that Israel is not one of the court’s member-states, partly depends on the court finding Israel unable or unwilling to investigate and prosecute its own citizens.