British human rights lawyer Amal Clooney is reportedly living in New York City these days while her movie star husband George Clooney performs in his Broadway debut, “Good Night and Good Luck.”
But her ability to stay in New York City or to go back and forth between the United States and Europe could be prevented by potential sanctions imposed by the Trump administration, according to People magazine, citing a report in the the Financial Times.
Last week, the Financial Times reported that the British Foreign Office had warned Amal Clooney and several other high-level U.K. attorneys that they could be the target of sanctions, due to their recommendations to the International Criminal Court last year that it pursue war crimes charges against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, related to Israel’s military response to Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 terrorist attacks.
In February, President Donald Trump issued Executive Order 14203, which ordered sanctions on the ICC, which has been empowered by 125 member states to investigate and try individuals charged with grave international crimes, the Washington Post reported. Trump’s order singled out ICC prosecutor Karim Khan for sanctions, People also aid.
Now the British Foreign Office has said that more sanctions could be handed down against Amal Clooney and other attorneys involved in the Netanyahu case. Given that Amal Clooney holds British citizenship, she could be prevented from entering the United States, even though she owns property with her husband in Los Angeles and New York City. The couple also have homes in the U.K., Italy and France.
It was reported last year that the couple would make New York City their home base while the “Ocean’s 11” actor performs in “Good Night and Good Luck,” a stage adaptation of his 2005 film about journalist Edward R. Murrow. The play opened last month.
It was specifically reported that Amal Clooney would join her husband with their twin 7-year-old son and daughter. She happens to be an adjunct law professor at Columbia University, but she also was expected to regularly travel to Europe for her legal work, including with the ICC, which is based in The Hague.
The Clooney marriage has been under scrutiny in recent weeks. Clooney made headlines when he told CBS Mornings that he had his wife of 11 years have never argued. “We’re trying to find something to fight about,” he told Gayle King.
In Touch Weekly suggested last week that the Clooneys never argue because they lead “separate lives.” Amal Clooney was noticeably absent from the star-studded opening night of her husband’s play.
While George Clooney told reporters that his wife was with their children, a source told In Touch Weekly that they also each have different interests. “The truth about their marriage is that they’re content raising a family together without having to be around each other all the time,” the source said.
Whatever is going on in the Clooney marriage, things could become even more complicated for the couple if Amal Clooney is barred from entering her husband’s home country.
Amal Clooney revealed last year that she had spent four months working with a panel of U.K.-based international law experts to review evidence for the ICC on alleged war crimes committed by both sides during the Israel-Gaza war. Clooney and the other panelists gave their support to the prosecutor in seeking arrest warrants, not just against Netanyahu but against former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
The court said it found “reasonable grounds” to believe that Netanyahu and Gallant were responsible for crimes during what he called the “total siege” of the Gaza Strip, including starvation of civilians as a method of warfare, willful killing and murder, intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population and extermination.
The ICC also issued arrest warrants for Hamas leaders, who have since been reported killed, for ordering the Oct. 7, 2023 terrorist attacks and the taking of hostages, the Washington Post said. The ICC alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes, including those of “murder; extermination; torture; and rape.”
In response to the arrest warrants, Netanyahu and Gallant and other Israeli leaders denounced the charges as “absurd and false lies.”
In calling for the sanctions against the ICC, Trump said that any effort by the court to investigate, arrest, detain or prosecute Americans and U.S. allies constitutes an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to U.S. national security and policy, the Washington Post reported.
The United States will impose “tangible and significant” consequences on those responsible for the “ICC’s transgressions,” which could include blocking property and assets, as well as suspending entry to the United States, Trump said.
