Last week the so-called “High Level Military Group” — consisting mainly of retired officers whose speciality is whitewashing the Israeli army — sent a 10-page memo to the International Criminal Court (ICC).

The court is currently weighing up an application from its chief prosecutor to issue warrants for the arrest of Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu and defence minister Yoav Gallant on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. 

The High Level Military Group (HLMG) was one of around 30 organisations authorised by the court to submit “observations” on the case and, unsurprisingly, it advised against issuing the warrants. Approving them, the group wrote, “would set standards that are unbearable and unrealistic with regards to military operations and the facilitation of humanitarian activities during active hostilities.” It added that “other democracies”, including Britain, would find such standards unacceptable too.

Members of the group had visited Israel and Gaza in July to make an “in-country assessment”– with considerable help from the IDF. Their submission to the ICC was mostly irrelevant to the legal issues facing the court but instead it gave a glowing account of Israel’s efforts to save Gaza from starvation and avoid unlawful killing of civilians.

'Restrictive' rules of engagement

The High Level Military Group was formed in 2015 “to address the implications for western warfare of fighting enemies who disregard the law of armed conflict”, according to its website .

Its first project was a report on the 2014 Gaza conflict known in Israel as Operation Protective Edge which resulted in the deaths of more than 2,000 Gazans and 72 Israelis, plus the destruction of some 10,000 homes.

The military issue, as HLMG saw it, was that Hamas gained an advantage by disregarding the law while the IDF “pursued well-defined objectives under appropriately restrictive rules of engagement, employing exhaustive protocols that fully comply with, and in several aspects exceed, the requirements of the law of armed conflict, to the detriment of the IDF’s tactical advantage”.

In preparing its report. HLMG made six visits and the Israeli government granted them “unprecedented access, undoubtedly in excess of what our own countries would afford in similar circumstances”.

The report concluded:

“In the overall conduct of its campaign, the IDF not only met its obligations under the law of armed conflict, but often exceeded them, both on the battlefield and in the humanitarian relief efforts that accompanied its operation. 

“In many cases where the fighting was concerned, this came at significant tactical cost to the IDF. It fought under restrictive rules of engagement and it is obvious that instances existed throughout the conflict where the IDF did not attack lawful military objectives on account of a deliberate policy of restraint.”

It added that “several members of the HLMG expressed strong concerns that the actions and practices of the IDF to prevent collateral damage were so extensive, over and above the requirements of the law of armed conflict, that they would curtail the effectiveness of our own militaries, were they to become constraining norms of warfare enacted in customary law.”

Between 2015 and 2022 HLMG published ten reports giving a favourable view of various Israeli military actions. After that it appears to have become dormant for a while until reactivated in response to the current Gaza conflict. Google searches show no significant activity in the interim and its website hasn't been updated. Its most recent post on X/Twitter congratulates Boris Johnson — “a spirited leader with a sense of history” — on becoming Britain’s prime minister and shows a photo of him in his previous role as foreign secretary holding one of HLMG’s reports ...
  

 
The group’s submission to the International Criminal Court was sent electronically from Madrid and digitally signed by one of its members, Dr Rafael Bardají . Though not ex-military, Bardají is a former national security adviser to the Spanish government. Perhaps, more importantly, in 2010 he was a founder of the Friends of Israel Initiative which funds most if not all of the High Level Military Group’s activities.
 

 
The main function of the Friends of Israel Initiative is to bolster support from non-Jews in the west, based on the questionable claim that Israel’s battles are the west’s battles too. It was set up at the instigation of former Spanish prime minister José María Aznar who had become enamoured with the American neocons. Among those who join were John Bolton (former US ambassador to the UN), Vaclav Havel (former Czech president), Alejandro Toledo (former president of Peru) and Lord David Trimble (former Ulster Unionist leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner).
 

 
A launch event was held at the House of Commons, sponsored by the right-wing Henry Jackson Society and hosted by Conservative MP Robert Halfon who once comically accused the Board of Deputies of British Jews of having a “left-of-centre agenda”.

The composition of the High Level Military Group has changed over the years but the most recent list, appended to its ICC submission, shows three retired British officers among its 11 members: Major Andrew Fox, Colonel Richard Kemp CBE, and Brigadier Ian Liles OBE.

The other ex-military members are General Vincenzo Camporini (Italy), Admiral Jose Maria Teran (Spain), Brigadier General Alain Lamballe (France), Lieutenant Colonel Geoffrey S Corn (USA) and Lieutenant General David A Deptula (USA).

There are two civilian members in addition to Bardají : Dutch politician Uri Rosenthal and Finnish politician Timo Soini.

Richard Kemp appears to be a particularly active member. He is named as the author of three of the group’s reports. In April he gave testimony to a parliamentary committee, speaking “effectively as a representative” of the HLMG and telling MPs that during the first six months of the current Gaza conflict he had spent most of his time in Israel, including time on the ground in Gaza observing the actions of the IDF.

“Israel is doing all it possibly can to comply with international humanitarian law in Gaza,” he assured the committee. “I have witnessed at first hand exactly the way this has been done.”