Owner of Gaza media building lodges complaint with ICC - RTE

The owner of a Gaza building housing international media that was destroyed in an Israeli airstrike is lodging a complaint with the International Criminal Court, his lawyer said.

The complaint by Jawad Mehdi says that the attack on 15 May which flattened Jala Tower, housing the offices of US news agency Associated Press and Al Jazeera television, was a "war crime".

The filing comes after the chief prosecutor of the ICC said last week that "crimes" may have been committed during the recent violence between Israel and the Palestinians.

"The owner of this building, who is a Palestinian, has mandated his lawyers to file a war crime complaint with the International Criminal Court," lawyer Gilles Devers said in a statement.

Mr Devers said outside the court, where around ten pro-Palestinian protesters were gathered, that Israel could show "no military objective" for the attack.

Mr Devers said: "We hear a lot that this tower could have been destroyed because there was equipment or an armed resistance team. This is something that we totally deny after studying the case.

"International law is that you can only harm civilian property if it is used for military purposes, and that was not the case. So we say it today in front of this court and in this complaint."

Mr Devers said the complaint would be formally sent to the court by email later today.