Khanna Demands Trump Arrest Netanyahu as Israeli PM Heads to the White House

A Progressive Chorus Grows Louder

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) called for President Donald Trump to abide by the International Criminal Court and arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Russian President Vladimir Putin. The demand, delivered in a hallway interview on Capitol Hill on July 25, puts Khanna squarely in alignment with one of the most politically charged positions in the Democratic Party — and it comes at a moment of maximum tension, just before Netanyahu's scheduled White House visit.

Khanna echoed New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani's call for the arrest of Netanyahu, telling MeidasTouch reporter Pablo Manriquez, "The American president should arrest Netanyahu or Putin in accordance with international law." "If the ICC has an arrest warrant for someone, they should be arrested by America if they come into American jurisdiction. It's simple international law," he added.

The ICC Warrant and the Limits of Local Power

The ICC issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu in 2024, accusing him of alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity linked to Israel's military campaign in Gaza following the Hamas attack on Israel in October 2023. Israel has rejected the allegations and criticized the ICC's action.

Khanna made his comments after Mayor Mamdani, who had vowed to have Netanyahu arrested, acknowledged on July 22 that he doesn't actually have the authority to do so. Any government official coming to the UN is protected by absolute head-of-state diplomatic immunity, and federal law dictates foreign policy and diplomatic relations, protecting heads of state from being arrested by local officials such as Mamdani. In other words, Mamdani's pledge was always more symbolic than legally executable — a fact that hasn't stopped the broader political conversation from intensifying.

Neither the U.S. nor Israel are part of the ICC, meaning it holds no jurisdiction over those countries. That legal reality forms the backbone of the Trump administration's position, and it complicates the argument being made by Khanna and Mamdani, even as they press the moral case.

Trump Shuts the Door — Khanna Pushes Back Anyway

President Donald Trump rejected the idea, saying Netanyahu would not face arrest while visiting the United States. "Benjamin Netanyahu will not be arrested, in any way, shape, or form, while in the United States of America," Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social.

Khanna conceded that it was unlikely the president would follow his call, accusing Trump of disregarding international law. "He's not a law-and-order president, and he doesn't really care about human rights or international law," said Khanna. "It's embarrassing to the United States and to the world community. I mean, here you have the ICC — it's not just Netanyahu, it's also Putin."

Personal Stakes and Political Ambitions

Khanna's comments came weeks after he said he was briefly detained by Israeli settlers and Israeli Defence Forces personnel while visiting a Palestinian village in the occupied West Bank — an incident the California congressman said could influence his political future. "Free advice to the Israelis: It's not a good idea to detain long-shot presidential candidates," Khanna told The New York Times. "Not how you're going to build good will with the next American president, whoever that is."

The episode has sharpened Khanna's public profile on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict at a critical moment. Adding another layer of complexity to the story, ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan — the official instrumental in delivering the arrest warrant against Netanyahu — was formally removed from his post on July 25 , after facing serious misconduct allegations. That development hands critics of the ICC a fresh argument, even as Khanna and Mamdani insist the warrant's legitimacy stands independent of the prosecutor who pursued it. Whether this debate shifts any policy remains doubtful in the short term, but it signals that the Gaza conflict will remain a defining fault line in American politics well into the 2028 presidential cycle.