He was indicted for crimes that the court says he committed against the people of Darfur, for war crimes and crimes against humanity. The press release issued by the court was quite to-the-point in explaining the reason for the indictment: “He [al-Bashir] is suspected of being criminally responsible, as an indirect (co-)perpetrator, for intentionally directing attacks against an important part of the civilian population of Darfur, Sudan, murdering, exterminating, raping, torturing and forcibly transferring large numbers of civilians, and pillaging their property.”

It was the first warrant of arrest ever issued for a sitting head of state by the court. In response to the indictment, al-Bashir defiantly and disparagingly expelled 13 humanitarian aid organizations from Darfur.

As has been well documented by the United Nations itself, more than 300,000 people have been killed in the past five years in Darfur; uncounted thousands have been harmed and abused through every vile form of atrocity, and an estimated 2.5 million people have been forced from their homes.

Many observers doubt al-Bashir will ever be brought to justice. But they contend that the indictment is at least an unambiguous moral clarion has been sounded that the world is outraged by and abhors what has been done to the victims of Darfur. Moreover and especially, they add, the world abhors that what was done in Darfur was done deliberately, with prior planning and evil intention; hence, the indictment.

But wait. Not everyone has been outraged by “the murdering, exterminating, raping, torturing, forcibly transferring large numbers of civilians and pillaging.”

The Arab League has never once condemned or expressed disapproval of the actions of the al-Bashir government.

Last week, in an act of inter-terrorist solidarity, Iran, Hamas and Syria sent top officials to Khartoum to denounce the warrant for Bashir’s arrest. Iran’s parliamentary speaker, Ali Larijani; Hamas’ second-in-command in its Damascus political office, Moussa Abu Marzouk; Syria’s parliamentary speaker, Mahmoud al-Abrash and various representatives of other Palestinian militant factions joined Sudanese dignitaries after prayers on Friday to shout their opprobrium at the West for deigning to consider “murdering, exterminating, raping, torturing,” etcetera, worthy of indictment.

The irony is too painful, and the hypocrisy is too blatant to ignore: Israel defends itself against unceasing terrorism from the Iranian- and Syrian-backed regime of Hamas. Western activists pillory Israel for doing so. Yet these same activists cannot find the conscience, let alone the words, to rebuke, reprove or reprimand Iran, Syria or Hamas for standing alongside the criminally indicted tyrant in Sudan.