World roundup: May 20 2024

Stories from Iran, Taiwan, Colombia, and elsewhere

TODAY IN HISTORY

May 20, 1498: Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama arrives at the port of Calicut (modern Kozhikode), completing his expedition from Lisbon around the African coast to India. Da Gama, who was expecting to extract favorable trading concessions from the ruler of Calicut, found instead that his token gifts were too shabby to win him any goodwill and Muslim traders spread scandalous gossip about the Portuguese arrivals. He left with only a smattering of local trade goods, but needless to say the opening of the trade route had some very long-lasting repercussions.

May 20, 1927: Abdulaziz Al Saud, also known as Ibn Saud, concludes the Treaty of Jeddah with the United Kingdom. Under the terms of the treaty, the UK recognized both Ibn Saud’s independence and his sovereignty over the kingdoms of the Nejd and the Hejaz, which he merged into Saudi Arabia in 1932. The treaty effectively recognized the Saudi conquest of the Hejaz at the expense of Britain’s Hashemite clients, while reaffirming an earlier commitment that Ibn Saud had made not to attack British protectorates in the Persian Gulf.

MIDDLE EAST

ISRAEL-PALESTINE

International Criminal Court prosecutor Karim Khan announced on Monday that he is pursuing arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, as well as Hamas leaders Yahya Sinwar, Mohammed Deif, and Ismail Haniyeh, on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Khan has to get approval from a three-judge panel before those warrants could be issued, a process that will take several weeks at a minimum. The backlash, unsurprisingly, has already begun—the Israeli government called the announcement a “historical disgrace,” while Hamas “strongly” condemned the inclusion of its senior leadership. This may be the extent of the ICC’s impact on this situation—the equation of this Israeli government with Hamas and the public embarrassment that holds for Netanyahu and Gallant.