MAGA Rabbi Shmuley Boteach’s Sons Allegedly Committed War Crimes in Gaza. Trump May Be Able to Protect Them.

They are two of the U.S. citizens included in a landmark criminal complaint filed against Israeli soldiers, a Belgian legal group says

“When you have sons fighting in the IDF, you live in a state of personal and permanent emotional conflict about the war and about the state of the Jewish people,” Rabbi Shmuley Boteach wrote in a column in the Jewish Journal this past summer. “Pride and fear. Defiance and surrender. Love and hate. You’re confused. Better not to write, isn’t it?” Yet Boteach, a celebrity rabbi known for his ties to President-elect Donald Trump and the MAGA movement, was unmistakably proud of his sons and he wanted the world to know it.

One month later, Rabbi Boteach shared with his nearly 250,000 followers on X photos and a video showcasing the military adventures of his eldest son, Mendy Boteach, an Israeli soldier who had been deployed inside Gaza. In one of the posts, Mendy is posing in his military uniform alongside fellow Israeli soldiers, smiling from ear to ear. The rabbi also posted a separate video shot from inside what appears to be a large room in a heavily damaged building. Scrawled in Hebrew on the walls is the phrase: “Bet Knesset Netzakh Netzrim,” which translates to “Eternal Netzrim Synagogue.” A former Israeli settlement in north-central Gaza, Netzrim was established in 1971 on land expropriated from a Palestinian family, according to a United Nations report.

In the tweets, sent during the same minute on July 21, Shmuley Boteach documented Mendy’s activities near what appears to be the old Netzrim settlement:

Rabbi Boteach posted a video in the tweet:

In October 2024, the Hind Rajab Foundation (HRF) included Boteach’s posts in a Gaza war crimes complaint brought before The International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague. Founded in 2024, HRF is a Belgium-based legal group that takes its name from a five-year-old girl killed by Israeli forces while trying to escape Gaza City. The complaint, or “communication,” accuses approximately 1,000 members of the Israeli military of carrying out a variety of war crimes, including looting, destruction of property, and attacks against civilians. In an emailed statement, the ICC’s public information unit of the prosecutor explained that the Rome Statute, the court’s founding treaty, allows “any individual or group from anywhere in the world” to submit information on alleged crimes to the court’s prosecutor. Under the court’s protocols, the information, which the ICC refers to as a “communication,” remains confidential.

Thirty-three of individuals named are Israeli binationals: 12 French, 4 Canadians, 3 British, 2 Dutch, and 12 Americans, including Mendy Boteach and his younger brother Yosef, according to HRF. The brothers, two of the approximately 23,000 Americans who have been serving in the Israeli military, are the first U.S. citizens known to be named in the war crimes complaint. The HRF complaint has not been endorsed or taken forward by prosecutors at this point.

If the ICC took up a case against an American citizen, the U.S. would likely sanction court officials working on the investigation to force it to drop a prosecution, according to experts—much as it did in 2020 under the first Trump administration after the court opened an investigation into war crimes committed by all sides—namely the Taliban, Afghan National Security Forces, and U.S. military and intelligence personnel. And Rabbi Boteach, a strong supporter of President Donald Trump, is reportedly in the running to serve as his special envoy to combat antisemitism.

Israel agreed to a ceasefire beginning on January 19 that, for now, halts its brutal siege on Gaza. Since October 7, 2023, more than 47,000 Palestinians have been killed—a number certain to rise as bodies are pulled from the rubble—and at least 10,000 remain missing. On January 20, 2025, Donald Trump began his second presidential term and almost immediately lifted sanctions that former President Joe Biden had placed on more than 30 settler organizations in the West Bank. Fresh attacks on Palestinian villages preceded and followed Trump’s decision.

Nick Kaufman, a defense lawyer for the ICC, told Drop Site News he believes it’s unlikely that the ICC will pursue cases like this brought by HRF because the court has already focused its efforts on top Israeli leaders rather than on their “foot soldiers,” he said. But Kaufman also acknowledged that any citizen who commits a war crime or crime against humanity in the Palestinian occupied territories can be prosecuted by the court, so long as the crime was committed after 2014 when the ICC formally established its jurisdiction in Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

“If there was an arrest warrant issued—and that’s a big if—then only state parties [to the Rome Statute] would be obliged to enforce it,” Kaufman said. Since the U.S. and Israel are not a party to the ICC, they would not be obliged to enforce such a warrant, he added.

Mendy Boteach did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

While HRF and the ICC declined to share the full HRF complaint, Drop Site News obtained excerpts of the complaint concerning Mendy Boteach. HRF president and spokesperson Dyab Abou Jahjah said that the video which shows the inside of the building was filmed by Mendy. Drop Site News could not independently verify this claim, but it is strongly supported by Rabbi Boteach’s own post.

In the excerpt of the complaint, HRF argues that Mendy Boteach’s actions, as seen in the video—allegedly participating in the destruction of civilian property not justified by military necessity—violated Article 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, a sweeping treaty universally recognized by all UN member nations. According to the treaty, “any destruction by the Occupying Power of real or personal property belonging individually or collectively to private persons…is prohibited, except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations.”

In its filing to The Hague, Abou Jahjah’s group claims that by entering a private Palestinian property and forcefully turning it into a Jewish synagogue, Mendy Boteach’s unit breached the legal codes that protect civilian homes and property from destruction, in whole or in part, during wartime.

Along with its complaint against the 1,000 individuals, HRF submitted more than 8,000 pieces of evidence. The evidence includes video and audio recordings, forensics reports, geolocation data tying each of the accused to the crimes they are accused of committing, and social media posts like those by Rabbi Boteach, the foundation said. Much of the lurid footage and photography was captured by the Israeli soldiers themselves—a practice that the Israeli military warned its own soldiers against after HRF and others began calling international attention to them, according to Ynetnews. Earlier this month, Ynet published “A guide for IDF soldiers” that quotes advice from Kaufman, the ICC defense lawyer, about what soldiers can do if they are arrested abroad under powers of universal jurisdiction to investigate war crimes.

As a teenager, Abou Jahjah received military training in Lebanon, his native country. Today, he is a prominent, controversial figure in Belgium, a self-described “maximalist” who believes Israel has no legitimacy as a state. He argued that by posting about his son's activities in Gaza, Rabbi Boteach effectively publicized the evidence needed to incriminate his son in the eyes of an international tribunal. “We have Mendy on video in the house—a civilian house—destroying property and transforming the house into a synagogue,” he said.

Rabbi Boteach has run in celebrity circles for decades. He has been a faithful friend to Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. during some of his most bizarre public scandals, including after Kennedy argued that Covid-19 may have been “ethnically targeted” to spare Ashkenazi Jews. The rabbi was also a spiritual counselor to Michael Jackson before an acrimonious falling out, and the author of the international best-seller Kosher Sex, a book about “sex, marriage, and personal relationships, drawing on traditional Jewish wisdom.”

A longtime Trump supporter, Boteach wrote this past summer that he opposed a ceasefire deal with Hamas, even while acknowledging that his personal stake in the matter compromised his values and principles. “When it’s your sons fighting the terrorists, you pray for an immediate cease-fire, whatever the cost,” he added.

A photo of Mendy Boteach from a tweet posted by his father. “My hero @idf soldier son Mendy, part of the first Jewish army in 2000 years. I could not be more proud of him and ask you all to pray for his and his comrades safety. #NeverAgain”

The U.S. has shown little regard for the ICC. During America’s War on Terror years, Congress authorized the use of military force to “liberate” any U.S. citizen held by the court for alleged war crimes. More recently, President Joe Biden called the ICC chief prosecutor’s effort to seek the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for war crimes “outrageous.”

In April 2021, Biden terminated Trump’s 2020 emergency order that allowed sanctions against the ICC after it opened an investigation into U.S. personnel (and certain allies) over alleged war crimes in Afghanistan. At the time, Biden noted the sanctions were “not an effective or appropriate strategy for addressing the United States' concerns with the ICC.” On the first day of his second term in office, President Trump revoked Biden’s termination of his order against the ICC.

International courts have already sought to bring Israel to account for its actions in Gaza.

The International Court of Justice, the supreme judicial body of the United Nations, ruled in January that there was “plausible” evidence to suggest that Israel may have committed acts of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. In November, the ICC issued arrest warrants for top officials in Israel, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. Israel has appealed the decision. (The ICC also listed three Hamas officials in his request for arrest warrants but withdrew them after Israeli forces killed them.)

HRF, meanwhile, has been monitoring the whereabouts of Israeli soldiers accused of war crimes. The group, which said it is independently funded by “justice loving citizens,” has filed around 50 complaints to courts around the world, mainly calling on authorities to investigate and issue arrests of Israeli soldiers whom they accuse of various war crimes.

While on vacation in Cyprus in November, one soldier received an “urgent call” from the Israeli government urging him to leave the country immediately for fear of being officially accused of war crimes. This month, a court in Brazil opened an investigation into a soldier vacationing in the country, prompting the Israeli military to issue the warning to its soldiers that they risk arrest while traveling abroad.

None of HRF’s 50 complaints have yet resulted in criminal proceedings. The ICC has yet to decide on whether to officially open an investigation in response to HRF’s October filing; Abou Jahjah’s group renewed its October call on the court to investigate the case after the court issued its arrest warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant.

The foundation continues its work since the ceasefire, Abou Jahjah added, by “cooperating with human rights organizations and volunteers who are already in Gaza collecting evidence.” He remains optimistic that the evidence tying Mendy Boteach to the looting and the destruction of property during wartime will prove irrefutable.

“When you see somebody really damaging civilian infrastructure, then you know: We have more than reasonable doubt,” he said. “We have [them] actually red-handed—we have caught them on camera.”