Category Home

Time to believe Gaza war crimes allegations

Israel is grappling with accusations of war crimes committed by its army during the recent bloodbath in Gaza. Some soldiers are coming clean, but the brass is doing its best to downplay these confessions. This story is from Haaretz

Time to believe Gaza war crimes allegations
Last update – 07:16 24/03/2009
By Amira Hass

Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi has difficulty believing the soldiers’ testimonies that they intentionally harmed Palestinian civilians, because the Israel Defense Forces is a moral army, he said on Sunday.

On the other hand, he believes the soldiers because they “have no reason to lie.” Then again, Ashkenazi is convinced that if what they said is true, these are isolated incidents.

Ashkenazi reacted like most Israelis – as though the reports, including those in Haaretz and Maariv, were the first about the Gaza offensive that were issued by someone other than the military spokesman or the military reporters, who rely on him for their information.

But ample information was available from Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch reports, based on statements collected from hundreds of people in the Gaza Strip in January and February.

Ashkenazi, like other Israelis, could have read the Red Cross’ protest during the offensive, that the IDF prevented medical teams from reaching wounded Palestinians by shooting at them. He or his aides could have gone to the Web site set up by Israeli human rights organizations, which was full of reports and testimonies.

His aides, had they wanted to, could have found the many questions foreign reporters sent to the IDF spokesman, seeking Ashkenazi’s comments before they filed their stories. They had details about families killed by IDF shells and bombs in their homes, about the lethal white phosphorus shells and about the shooting of civilians waving white flags. The had cataloged the massive destruction of plants, orchards, fields, cowsheds and apartment buildings. Much evidence of these outrages was also published inside Haaretz.

The IDF’s legal advisers must have read it all. Including, perhaps, that judges who participated in investigation committees into crimes in Darfur, the former Yugoslavia and East Timor want to set up a similar international committee to investigate “all the parties” in the IDF offensive on Gaza. These people have concluded that the events go beyond isolated incidents and that the problem is not only in the soldiers’ conduct, but the instructions from the senior military ranks and the ministers in charge.

Shades of Abu Ghraib. Those in charge are intent on covering their tracks, blaming all the problems on a few bad apples. The morality of an army is not worth anything if those in charge turn the worst impulses of mankind loose upon the Enemy. People like to hide from the cold hard facts of just how brutal soldiers can be, especially when their heads are filled with propaganda about the evil Enemy who must be crushed. The people of Gaza chose Hamas in free elections, which many Israelis took as a direct provocation, since Hamas resists the Israeli occupation, earning the label terrorist. Isolating Hamas did not accomplish the desired goal of ousting them from power, so Israel took more direct action, attacking a virtually defenseless people in the guise of stopping the rocket fire from Gaza. The attack was so disproportionate and one-sided, there really was not a battle. The Israeli Army basically got free rein to take out its frustrations on innocent people, though in the eyes of many Israelis, the Gazans were not innocent, because they voted for Hamas, avowed enemies of Israel. Even if that could justify the attack, there are rules of war, which Israel seems to take great pride in violating, as if any tactic is justified to crush the enemies of Israel.

One might hope something good will come of this, but unless USA sees fit to reprimand Israel, Israel will treat the fallout of the Gaza attack as just another public relations problem to be swept under the carpet. Israelis routinely scoff at world opinion, claiming those who criticize Israeli actions are anti-Semitic, or do not understand the facts on the ground. Internal dissension, such as skepticism of the pronouncements of authority often found in Haaretz, is more likely to have an impact on Israeli policy. US criticism could have a great impact, but US politicians rarely have the nerve to go beyond gentle chiding of Israel, since Israel is supposedly such a wonderful ally. In a way, that is true, since Israel and USA are notorious international scofflaws, so they stick together.

This entry was posted by Aletha on Monday, March 23rd, 2009 at 11:01 pm

27 Responses to “Time to believe Gaza war crimes allegations”

  1. Aletha Says:
    March 30th, 2009 at 10:28 pm

    The Israeli army has investigated charges that its soldiers killed civilians in Gaza, but has dismissed the allegations. This AP story is from Yahoo News

    Israel army: No charges in Gaza probe
    By JOSEF FEDERMAN, Associated Press Writer
    Mon Mar 30, 5:38 pm ET

    JERUSALEM – The Israeli army on Monday closed an investigation into alleged killings of civilians during its offensive in the Gaza Strip, saying soldiers’ testimonies were based on hearsay, “purposely exaggerated” and not supported by facts.

    Allegations of wrongful shootings emerged from some soldiers speaking in a closed-door meeting at a military prep school. Their accounts, along with their reports of vandalism in Palestinian homes, were published by Israeli media earlier this month.

    The army’s chief prosecutor angrily accused the soldiers of harming Israel’s international image. “It will be difficult to evaluate the damage done to the image and morals of the Israel Defense Forces and its soldiers … in Israel and the world,” Brig. Gen. Avichai Mendelblit said.

    Human rights groups accused the military of carrying out a biased and hasty inquiry that ignored key evidence and urged an independent body be formed to investigate Israeli army activity in Gaza.

    One case involved the killing of an elderly woman by a rooftop sniper, and the second described a sniper fatally shooting a mother and two children who had entered a no-go zone, according to a transcript of the testimony obtained by The Associated Press.

    The soldiers’ accounts set off soul-searching in a country where the military is widely revered. They also echoed Palestinian allegations that Israel’s assault did not distinguish between civilians and combatants, and fueled assertions by some international rights groups that Israel violated the laws of war.

    More than 1,400 Palestinians were killed, including more than 900 civilians, according to the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, which published a list of names of the dead. Israel has said the toll was lower, and the “vast majority” of the dead were militants. But it did not publish a list to support the assertion.

    In announcing the findings Monday, the army said the soldiers’ testimonies “were purposely exaggerated and made extreme, in order to make a point” to those attending the closed session.

    In the case of the elderly woman shot by a sniper, the soldier “was only repeating a rumor he had heard” that she was gunned down without provocation, the army said.

    Maj. Yehoshua Gutler, legal assistant to the military’s advocate general, said the elderly woman was wearing bulky clothing and the soldiers had reason to believe she was a threat after intelligence reports showed “Hamas was going to use an elderly woman as a suicide bomber as they had in the past.”

    The woman continued to advance despite repeated calls to stop and warning shots fired in the air, and soldiers had “no choice” but to shoot, Gutler said.

    A second soldier had reported a sniper shooting a woman and two children but later clarified his statement to say it was “an incident that he had not witnessed,” according to the findings.

    Gutler said the investigation showed that the family “was not fired at and not put in peril at any stage and left the premises unharmed.” Gutler said a soldier had instead fired at militants in the opposite direction.

    In a joint statement, nine Israeli rights groups said the decision to close the investigation without bringing charges “only strengthens the need for the attorney general to allow for an independent nonpartisan investigative body to be established in order to look into all Israeli army activity” in Gaza.

    Defense Minister Ehud Barak said the investigation showed that Israel possesses “the most moral army in the world.”

    In a tour of Gaza last week, the AP saw evidence of vandalism and destruction in Palestinian homes commandeered by the Israeli military. Graffiti in Hebrew was scrawled on walls, trash littered the floors and makeshift sniper holes were stuffed with cloth or plastic in several homes.

    The Israeli propaganda machine is in full swing. The most moral army in the world? Whom does Barak think he is kidding? Barak must have a swelled head, since he made a deal to join the Netanyahu government, allowing him to keep his post as Defense Minister. General Mendelblit also has his nerve, blaming honest soldiers too appalled by what they witnessed to keep silent for damaging the image of the Israeli army. No, that image is tarnished for good reasons. Some naive people are finally getting a clue just how immoral and oppressive IDF is. There is nothing moral about an occupying force abusing its power.

    Israel has no shame, willing to sweep under the carpet anything that might be embarrassing, but not willing to change its ways. Denial and spin carry the day, so whatever an independent investigation may find that contradicts the official story will be denounced as more evidence of international anti-Semitism. Pro-Zionist groups have already been screaming about an upsurge of anti-Semitism in response to the attack on Gaza. People were protesting the attack, calling IDF murderers and such. To the powers that be in Israel, such accusations are unfair, unwarranted, biased, and proof of anti-Semitism. It does not matter that these accusations happen to be accurate. Israel lives in its own world, where only Israelis and its loyal to a fault US allies understand what Israel is up against and why Israeli actions violating international law are necessary.

  2. Aletha Says:
    April 16th, 2009 at 8:33 pm

    The UN investigation into Israeli war crimes in the Gaza invasion will get no cooperation from Israel, which claims the UN Human Rights Council is biased against Israel. This story is from Al Jazeera

    Israel snubs UN Gaza war inquiry
    Thursday, April 16, 2009

    An Israeli foreign ministry spokesperson has confirmed to Al Jazeera that it will not co-operate with a United Nations investigation into alleged war crimes during the 22-day assault on the Gaza Strip.

    Up to 1,300 Palestinians, mostly women and children, were killed before Israel ended the offensive in January.

    Thirteen Israelis, 10 of them soldiers, were killed during the same period.

    The UN Human Rights Council has appointed Richard Goldstone, a South African judge and former UN war crimes prosector, to examine claims of human rights violations by both Israeli forces and Palestinian fighters during the conflict.

    Israel has previously complained that the UN body is biased against it.

    “The investigation has no moral ground since it decided even before it started who is guilty and of what,” Yigal Palmor, a foreign ministry spokesman, said earlier this month.

    But Israel’s refusal to work with the investigators raises questions about whether an adequate investigation can be completed.

    However, Israel said that Goldstone, who is Jewish and has close ties to Israel, is not the problem.

    “(It’s) not about Justice Goldstone,” Aharon Leshno Yaar, the Israeli ambassador to UN organisations in Geneva, said on Tuesday.

    “It’s clear to everybody who follows this council and the way that it treats Israel that justice cannot be the outcome of this mission.”

    Clear as mud. Israel has a great deal to hide, so it slings the mud, hoping to create the impression whatever the council finds will be tainted by bias against Israel. As if whatever the internal Israeli investigation found was not tainted by bias against Palestinians? Once again Israel demonstrates it has no shame, no respect for international law or human rights when it comes to its ways of dealing with Palestinians. The investigation can have no moral ground and its outcome cannot be justice, according to Israel, because Israel knows what the conclusions will be and cannot admit the truth of those conclusions. The truth is too bitter a pill to swallow, so Israel must continue to obfuscate, deny, spin, maintaining the fantasy of the most moral army in the world. One of the great ironies is that Israel is always accusing its critics of moral relativism. Like any outlaw without honor, Israel always has some way to justify its actions as moral and necessary, so any criticism must be on shaky moral ground. These masters of spin ought to take a good hard look in the mirror.

  3. Aletha Says:
    April 22nd, 2009 at 10:29 pm

    The Israeli army has completed its whitewash. Naturally it exonerated itself, though it did confess to some mistakes. This story is from the Los Angeles Times

    Israel army clears itself in Gaza war
    By Batsheva Sobelman
    4:24 PM PDT, April 22, 2009
    Reporting from Jerusalem — The Israeli military said Wednesday that internal investigations concluded that the army “operated in accordance with international law” throughout last winter’s war in the Gaza Strip against Hamas fighters who terrorized Israeli civilians and, according to the army, exploited Palestinians as human shields.

    The Israel Defense Forces conceded that Palestinian civilians died because of mistakes in intelligence and targeting, but said the military did not find any case in which an Israeli soldier deliberately shot a civilian. International human rights organizations have called for independent investigations into war crimes allegations against the Israelis.

    Army Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi appointed five colonels to investigate soldiers’ conduct during the operation, known in Israel as Operation Cast Lead. They examined “tens” of cases involving claims that the military had targeted United Nations and other international facilities, as well as medical facilities and personnel. They also studied incidents involving particularly high numbers of civilian casualties, use of weapons containing phosphorus and damage to infrastructure and destruction of buildings by ground forces.

    “The investigations revealed a very small number of incidents in which intelligence or operational errors took place during the fighting,” the army said. “These unfortunate incidents were unavoidable and occur in all combat situations, in particular of the type which Hamas forced on the IDF by choosing to fight from within the civilian population.”

    Defense Minister Ehud Barak expressed regret for the suffering of innocent people but said the Israeli army does not fear investigations and is one of the world’s most moral forces.

    Concerning the use of white phosphorus, the army has maintained that all use of such munitions was in keeping with international law. Still, it discontinued the use of phosphorus relatively early because of criticism. Human Rights Watch has charged that Israel’s use of phosphorus was indiscriminate, caused unnecessary suffering and death, and constituted evidence of war crimes.

    Allegations of war crimes have persisted since the fighting ended in January. A number of Israeli soldiers have come forward to say that in some cases civilian Palestinian lives were not respected.

    The Israeli government has pledged its legal support to any officials or soldiers who might be charged abroad. News reports from Oslo said Wednesday that a group of lawyers filed a complaint accusing 10 Israelis of war crimes in Gaza under Norway’s new universal jurisdiction law. Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Barak and opposition leader and former Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni were among the 10.

    Israeli and international rights organizations have urged Israel to cooperate with a U.N. inquiry led by Justice Richard Goldstone, a South African who formerly was chief prosecutor for the war crimes tribunals on Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia.

    The stench of spin is overwhelming. Israel does not fear investigations of its army? Then why the refusal to cooperate with the UN investigation? The insistence that IDF operated in accordance with international law is quite a stretch. IDF must have its own interpretation of international law, by which IDF can do no wrong, so any consequences of its actions that might look like violations of international law must be unfortunate mistakes. For such a moral upstanding army, how could it be otherwise? No, the accusations of war crimes must be coming from anti-Semitism! But the US friends of Israel will go along with the charade, since USA uses the same spin tactics to exonerate its own violations of international law.

  4. Aletha Says:
    May 5th, 2009 at 9:51 pm

    UN has completed its investigation, though secretary general Ban Ki-moon has censored the full report and rejected its call for a full investigation, releasing only his own summary, possibly due to pressure from USA. The summary is damning enough, drawing instant dismissal from Israel. This story is from the Guardian

    UN accuses Israel of Gaza ‘negligence or recklessness’
    Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem and Ed Pilkington New York
    guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 5 May 2009 19.10 BST

    A United Nations inquiry today accused the Israeli military of “negligence or recklessness” in its conduct of the January war in Gaza and said the organisation should press claims for reparations for deaths and damage.

    The first investigation into the three-week war by anyone other than human rights researchers and journalists held the Israeli government responsible in seven separate cases in which UN property was damaged and UN staff and other civilians were hurt or killed.

    However, the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, rejected the report’s call for a full and impartial investigation into the war, and refused to publish the complete 184-page report. Only Ban’s own summary of the report (pdf) has been released.

    Israel rejected the inquiry’s findings, even before the summary was released, as “tendentious” and “patently biased”.

    The board of inquiry, led by Ian Martin, a Briton who is a former head of Amnesty International and a former UN special envoy to East Timor and Nepal, had limited scope, looking only at cases of death, injury or damage involving UN property and staff. But its conclusions amount to a major challenge to Israel.

    It found the Israeli military’s actions “involved varying degrees of negligence or recklessness”, and that the military took “inadequate” precautions towards UN premises. It said the deaths of civilians should be investigated under the rules of international humanitarian law.

    The UN should take action “to seek accountability and pursue claims to secure reparation or reimbursement” for UN expenses and payments over deaths or injury to UN staff and damage to UN property where the responsibility lay with Israel, Hamas or any other party, the report added. In total, more than $11m worth of damage was caused to UN premises.

    The inquiry looked in detail at nine incidents, in which several Palestinians died. It found the Israeli military responsible in seven cases where it had “breached the inviolability” of the UN. In one other case, Palestinian militants, probably from Hamas, were held responsible; in a final case, responsibility was unclear.

    The report summary will now go to the UN security council. In a later press conference , Ban confirmed that he would be seeking no further official inquiry into the Gaza events. But he did say he would be looking for reparations from Israel on a “case-by-case” basis.

    The secretary general was asked whether his decision not to publish the full report amounted to a watering down of the inquiry’s findings. He categorically denied the suggestion: the inquiry was independent, and he was powerless to edit its conclusions.

    Israel’s foreign ministry said the Israeli military had already investigated its own conduct during the war and “proved beyond doubt” that it had not fired intentionally at UN buildings. It dismissed the UN inquiry.

    “The state of Israel rejects the criticism in the committee’s summary report and determines that in both spirit and language the report is tendentious, patently biased and ignores the facts presented to the committee,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.

    It said the inquiry had “preferred the claims of Hamas, a murderous terror organisation, and by doing so has misled the world”.

    Public relations spin at its worst. Israel is trying is mislead the world, but few outside its blindly faithful defenders will be fooled. Its internal investigation proved nothing besides its indubitable ability to deny the truth. At least Obama is leaning on Israel to accept the concept of a Palestinian state, but Israel is again making noise about attacking Iran.

    Rogue nations never have any qualms about skewing the facts to suit their agenda. As in manifest destiny, the ends justify the means. USA should cut off at least its military aid. Israel has enough high powered weapons to make it a major military power, and has abundantly proved beyond doubt its lack of capacity to handle that power wisely or within the bounds of international law.

  5. Aletha Says:
    June 30th, 2009 at 9:54 pm

    The war crimes continue. Israel just stopped a ship attempting to bring humanitarian supplies to Gaza. Cynthia McKinney and Nobel Prize winner Mairead Maguire were on that ship. This story is from BBC News

    Israelis intercept Gaza aid ship
    Israeli forces have boarded a ship trying to carry aid and pro-Palestinian activists to the Gaza Strip in defiance of Israel’s blockade of the territory.

    The 20 passengers include former US congresswoman Cynthia McKinney and Nobel Prize winner Mairead Maguire.

    The activists also include some Britons, campaigners said.

    Ms McKinney described it as “an outrageous violation of international law”, as the boat was on a humanitarian mission and was not in Israeli waters.

    The Israeli military said the boat was trying to enter Gaza illegally.

    The US-based Free Gaza Movement has breached the blockade five times since August 2008.

    Two other attempts by the activist group were stopped by Israeli warships during Israel’s three-week military offensive in Gaza in December and January.

    Israel keeps a tight hold on Gaza, which is ruled by the militant Palestinian group Hamas.

    The Israeli military said the passengers and crew of the Greek-registered ship Arion would be handed over to immigration authorities in Ashdod, and its humanitarian aid cargo would be taken to Gaza by road after a security check.

    “An Israeli navy force intercepted, boarded and took control of the cargo boat Arion… as it was illegally attempting to enter the Gaza Strip,” a military spokesman said.

    The mission is the latest by the Free Gaza Movement, which has renamed the ferry Spirit of Humanity.

    “This is an outrageous violation of international law against us. Our boat was not in Israeli waters, and we were on a human rights mission to the Gaza Strip,” said Ms McKinney in a statement.

    “President [Barack] Obama just told Israel to let in humanitarian and reconstruction supplies, and that’s exactly what we tried to do. We’re asking the international community to demand our release so we can resume our journey.”

    On Monday, a report by the International Committee of the Red Cross described the 1.5 million Palestinians living in Gaza as people “trapped in despair”, unable to rebuild their lives after Israel’s offensive.

    Israel has its nerve, interfering with humanitarian shipments, but that is par for the course, since Israel refuses to acknowledge that its occupation of Palestinian lands is illegal. In that context, this is just another instance of Israel flouting international law. Israel is probably trying to make a point about how it intends to ignore the demands from Obama and Clinton to freeze the settlements. Israel does not mind the people of Gaza being trapped in despair; it created that situation and intends to prolong it, hoping Gazans will blame Hamas for their misery. That strategy will not work, but Israel knows desperate people commit desperate acts, which provides Israel more excuses to attack those Hamas terrorists.

  6. Aletha Says:
    July 1st, 2009 at 10:02 pm

    Amnesty International has detailed evidence of Israeli war crimes during the assault on Gaza. This story is from AFP

    Amnesty accuses Israel of using human shields in Gaza
    By Leigh Baldwin – 8 hours ago

    JERUSALEM (AFP) — Amnesty International on Thursday accused Israeli forces of war crimes, saying they used children as human shields and conducted wanton attacks on civilians during their offensive in the Gaza Strip.

    The London-based human rights group also accused Hamas of war crimes, but said it found no evidence that the Islamist rulers of Gaza used civilians as human shields during the 22-day offensive Israel launched on December 28.

    It also reiterated its call for an international arms embargo against Israel.

    “Much of the destruction was wanton and resulted from direct attacks on civilian objects,” Amnesty said in a study.

    Israeli troops forced Palestinians to stay in one room of their home while turning the rest of the house into a base and sniper position, “effectively using the families, both adults and children, as human shields and putting them at risk,” the group said.

    “Intentionally using civilians to shield a military objective, often referred to as using ‘human shields’ is a war crime,” Amnesty said.

    It could not support Israeli claims that Hamas used human shields. It said it found no evidence Palestinian fighters directed civilians to shield military objectives from attacks, forced them to stay in buildings used by militants, or prevented them from leaving commandeered buildings.

    However, the report did point out that Hamas and other armed groups fired hundreds of rockets into southern Israel. “Such unlawful attacks constitute war crimes and are unacceptable,” said Donatella Rovera, who led an Amnesty mission to Gaza and southern Israel.

    “Hundreds of civilians were killed in attacks carried out using high-precision weapons, air-delivered bombs and missiles, and tank shells.

    “Others, including women and children, were shot at short range when posing no threat to the lives of the Israeli soldiers,” it said.

    “Most of the cases investigated by Amnesty International of close-range shootings involve individuals, including children and women, who were shot at as they were fleeing their homes in search of shelter.

    “Others were going about their daily activities. The evidence indicates that none could have reasonably been perceived as a threat to the soldiers who shot them and that there was no fighting going on in their vicinity when they were shot,” the report said, adding that “wilful killings of unarmed civilians are war crimes.”

    It said Israel’s use of white phosphorus shells was also a clear breach of international law.

    White phosphorus is not illegal if used as a smokescreen in open areas “but it should not be used in a densely populated area as it was used here,” Rovera told AFP, adding that her team saw Palestinians with “hideous burns” from white phosphorus shells.

    The rights group was also critical of Israel’s use of flechette rounds — artillery shells which explode to emit hundreds of steel darts.

    These are designed for use in open battle but were employed by Israel in built-up areas, a clear breach of the international rules of war, said Chris Cobb-Smith, an artillery expert engaged by Amnesty.

    With its dazzling array of high-tech weaponry, Israel was perfectly capable of distinguishing between civilian and military targets, he told AFP.

    Asked if Israel had deliberately targetted unarmed civilians, he said it was “very difficult to come to any other conclusion”.

    Indeed. These are not the actions of an army taking great pains to avoid civilian casualties. I wonder if Israel will claim Amnesty purposely exaggerated and made extreme its report, in order to make a point. Since Israel insists it has the most moral army in the world, it will no doubt find some way to dispute the report, but war crimes are not so easily spun into justifiable actions, at least not to fool an objective observer. However, since Israel cares little for public opinion outside its own citizenry and USA, it may be content to stand on its whitewashed version of events.

  7. Laur Says:
    July 3rd, 2009 at 3:47 pm

    When does this ever end? Honestly? It’s always the same from Israel (backed by the US, perhaps now with a different word choice from Obama) and hell for everyone in the middle east, especially the Palestinians, continues.

  8. Aletha Says:
    July 7th, 2009 at 12:19 am

    I do not think it will end until Israel is required to heed international law. Since USA is another international scofflaw and routinely vetoes Security Council resolutions Israel does not like, Israel is in no hurry to change.

  9. Aletha Says:
    July 7th, 2009 at 10:21 pm

    Here is a Letter from an Israeli Jail, by Cynthia McKinney

    This is Cynthia McKinney and I’m speaking from an Israeli prison cellblock in Ramle. [I am one of] the Free Gaza 21, human rights activists currently imprisoned for trying to take medical supplies to Gaza, building supplies – and even crayons for children, I had a suitcase full of crayons for children. While we were on our way to Gaza the Israelis threatened to fire on our boat, but we did not turn around. The Israelis high-jacked and arrested us because we wanted to give crayons to the children in Gaza. We have been detained, and we want the people of the world to see how we have been treated just because we wanted to deliver humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza.

    At the outbreak of Israel’s Operation ‘Cast Lead’ [in December 2008], I boarded a Free Gaza boat with one day’s notice and tried, as the US representative in a multi-national delegation, to deliver 3 tons of medical supplies to an already besieged and ravaged Gaza.

    During Operation Cast Lead, U.S.-supplied F-16′s rained hellfire on a trapped people. Ethnic cleansing became full scale outright genocide. U.S.-supplied white phosphorus, depleted uranium, robotic technology, DIME weapons, and cluster bombs – new weapons creating injuries never treated before by Jordanian and Norwegian doctors. I was later told by doctors who were there in Gaza during Israel’s onslaught that Gaza had become Israel’s veritable weapons testing laboratory, people used to test and improve the kill ratio of their weapons.

    The world saw Israel’s despicable violence thanks to al-Jazeera Arabic and Press TV that broadcast in English. I saw those broadcasts live and around the clock, not from the USA but from Lebanon, where my first attempt to get into Gaza had ended because the Israeli military rammed the boat I was on in international water … It’s a miracle that I’m even here to write about my second encounter with the Israeli military, again a humanitarian mission aborted by the Israeli military.

    The Israeli authorities have tried to get us to confess that we committed a crime … I am now known as Israeli prisoner number 88794. How can I be in prison for collecting crayons to kids?

    Zionism has surely run out of its last legitimacy if this is what it does to people who believe so deeply in human rights for all that they put their own lives on the line for someone else’s children. Israel is the fullest expression of Zionism, but if Israel fears for its security because Gaza’s children have crayons then not only has Israel lost its last shred of legitimacy, but Israel must be declared a failed state.

    I am facing deportation from the state that brought me here at gunpoint after commandeering our boat. I was brought to Israel against my will. I am being held in this prison because I had a dream that Gaza’s children could color & paint, that Gaza’s wounded could be healed, and that Gaza’s bombed-out houses could be rebuilt.

    Now perhaps if President Obama or Secretary of State Clinton were saying this, Israel would have to pay attention, but if there has been any official protest of this paranoid interference with humanitarian aid, I have not heard about it. Israel will deport Ms. McKinney and her colleagues, while most US politicians keep mum, as if her mission presented an actual security risk to Israel.

  10. Aletha Says:
    September 15th, 2009 at 10:52 pm

    The United Nations investigation has concluded both sides are guilty of war crimes. Prosecution by the International Criminal Court may be in the offing. Israel still denies it did anything wrong, and claims the investigation was biased and rewards terrorism. This AP story is from Yahoo News

    UN probe: evidence of war crimes in Gaza conflict
    By JOHN HEILPRIN, Associated Press Writer
    Tue Sep 15, 5:21 pm ET

    UNITED NATIONS – A U.N. investigation concluded Tuesday that both sides in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in Gaza committed war crimes and possible crimes against humanity, raising the prospect that officials may seek prosecution in the International Criminal Court.

    The probe led by former South African judge Richard Goldstone concluded that “Israel committed actions amounting to war crimes, possibly crimes against humanity,” during its Dec. 27-Jan. 18 military operations against Palestinian rocket squads in the Gaza Strip.

    In a 575-page report, Goldstone and three other investigators also found evidence “that Palestinian armed groups committed war crimes, as well as possibly crimes against humanity.”

    “There should be no impunity for international crimes that are committed,” said Goldstone, a veteran war crimes investigator who has served as chief prosecutor for the U.N. criminal tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. “It’s very important that justice should be done.”

    The report said that Israel’s attacks in the Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City, including the shelling of a house where soldiers had forced Palestinian civilians to assemble, amounted to war crimes.

    It found seven incidents in which civilians were shot while leaving their homes trying to run for safety, waving white flags and sometimes even following Israeli instructions, as well as the targeting of a mosque at prayer time, killing 15 people, were also war crimes.

    Investigators found no evidence the mosque was used to store weapons or for any military activity by Palestinian armed groups, but said they were unable to look more broadly at Israel’s allegation that the mosques were used generally by Palestinian groups for storing weapons.

    A “direct and intentional attack” on the Al Quds Hospital and an adjacent ambulance depot in Gaza City “may constitute war crimes,” the report said.

    Several Palestinians told the mission they were used as human shields by the Israeli forces, the report said, noting the case of Majdi Abd Rabbo, a 39-year-old intelligence officer of the Palestinian authority who was forced to walk ahead of the troops as they searched his and his neighbor’s house. Rabbo was forced to undress down to his underwear in front of the soldiers and his sons had to strip naked, the report said.

    The investigators have recommended that the Security Council require both sides to launch their own, credible investigation into the conflict within three months, and to follow that up with action in their courts. If either side refuses, the investigators recommend that the Security Council refer the evidence for prosecution by the International Criminal Court, the world’s first permanent war crimes tribunal, within six months.

    The Palestinian group Hamas rules Gaza and has been accused by Israel of using human shields during the conflict, in which almost 1,400 Palestinians were killed — many of them civilians. Thirteen Israelis also died, including four civilians.

    “The mandate of the mission and the resolution establishing it prejudged the outcome of any investigation, gave legitimacy to the Hamas terrorist organization and disregarded the deliberate Hamas strategy of using Palestinian civilians as cover for launching terrorist attacks,” Israel’s Foreign Ministry said.

    Hamas officials were not immediately available for comment.

    Goldstone, who is Jewish and has strong ties to Israel, told reporters at U.N. headquarters that “to accuse me of being anti-Israel is ridiculous,” anticipating such criticism. He said it was in the interest of both Israelis and Palestinians to establish the truth of what happened in the conflict.

    In a joint statement, nine Israeli human rights groups said the findings join a “long series of reports” indicating that Israeli and Hamas violated the laws of war. It called on the Israeli government to conduct an “independent and impartial investigation.”

    “The groups expect the government of Israel to respond to the substance of the report’s findings and to desist from its current policy of casting doubt upon the credibility of anyone who does not adhere to the establishment’s narrative,” it said.

    In a preliminary investigation earlier this year, the army cleared itself of any systematic wrongdoing during the war and said any rights violations were isolated incidents. Since then, it has opened a series of separate investigations into the conduct of individual soldiers.

    According to Haaretz, Hamas has also rejected the conclusions of this investigation, saying it was unfair, unbalanced, and completely misrepresented reality. Hamas apparently views the condemnation of its indiscriminate rocket attacks as downplaying the culpability of Israel. Mr. Goldstone only agreed to head up this investigation if he could look at both sides. Israel had such a tremendous edge, the invasion was more like a massacre than a war, but Hamas might be better off to accept this investigation as vindication than to denounce it because it did not find Hamas blameless. Israel has always ignored international condemnation. If this investigation leads to a prosecution of Israeli officials by the International Criminal Court, it will be a watershed moment in the history of the Middle East, one that might finally force Israel to realize it cannot go on illegally occupying Palestinian land and terrorizing its inhabitants forever.

  11. Aletha Says:
    September 18th, 2009 at 12:29 am

    UN ambassador Susan Rice has also rejected the report, predictably taking the side of Israel. If ever there was a chance to show the world USA was serious about being a honest broker for peace in the Middle East, this was it, but the Administration has blown it. This story is from the Washington Post

    U.S. Rejects U.N. Proposal to Compel War Crimes Probes of Gaza Conflict

    By Colum Lynch
    Washington Post Staff Writer
    Thursday, September 17, 2009; 8:01 PM

    UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 17 — Susan E. Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, rejected a U.N. proposal to compel Israel and Hamas, the Islamist movement that controls the Gaza Strip, to conduct credible investigations into war crimes during last winter’s war in Gaza or face possible prosecution by an international prosecutor.

    Rice said that violations of human rights in Gaza should be addressed by the U.N. Human Rights Council, which created Goldstone’s panel in April, and not by the Security Council, which has the authority to authorize an international probe.

    Rice said the United States is still reviewing Goldstone’s 574-page report and has not made a judgment on the merits of his findings. But she said it has long had “very serious concerns” about the mandate the Human Rights Council gave to Goldstone, calling it “unbalanced, one-sided and basically unacceptable.” Israeli officials have said the mandate was biased against Israel.

    “Our view is that we need to be focused on the future,” Rice told reporters outside the Security Council. “This is a time to work to cement progress towards the resumption of negotiations and their early and successful conclusion and our efforts, and we hope the efforts of others will be directed to that end.”

    What is this, besides evasion? The Human Rights Council should address the war crimes, but its mandate was unbalanced and unacceptable? Is that a balanced view, or one skewed by blind faith in Israeli integrity? This focus on the future is the same evasive maneuver Obama has used to avoid his responsibility to investigate and prosecute the crimes of the previous Administration. Since the invasion of Gaza was ended just before Obama took office, does that mean his Administration has no responsibility to do anything about Israeli war crimes during that invasion? How convenient and predictable; once again USA has whitewashed Israeli war crimes.

  12. Aletha Says:
    September 25th, 2009 at 12:41 am

    Prime Minister Netanyahu has no shame. He excoriated UN delegates who did not walk out on the speech by Ahmadinejad yesterday, asking, “Have you no shame?” Then he repeated the deliberate mistranslation that Ahmadinejad has promised to wipe out Israel. Netanyahu is a master of propaganda, implying that Israel cannot take any risks for peace while UN members refuse to condemn the Goldstone report. This story is from Al Jazeera

    Netanyahu urges UN action on Iran
    Israel’s prime minister has told the United Nations it must prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons – and accused the world body of bias towards the Palestinians.

    In an address to the UN General Assembly on Thursday Binyamin Netanyahu referred to Iranian leaders as the “tyrants of Tehran” and urged Western states to stand up to the Iranian government’s “religious fanaticism”.

    “The struggle against Iran pits civilisation against barbarism … History could be reversed if primitive fanaticism acquires deadly weapons,” he said.

    “The jury is still out on the United Nations, and the signs are not encouraging,” Netanyahu said.

    Netanyahu criticised the recent UN-backed Goldstone Commission Report into Israel’s war on Gaza in December and January, which concluded there was substantial evidence to suggest that Israel committed war crimes during its offensive on the Palestinian territory.

    “Rather than condemn terrorism, some at the UN are condemning its victims … It is not easy to fight terrorists firing from schools and mosques,” he said, referring to Palestinian armed groups.

    Netanyahu emphasised that all Palestinians must formally recognise the state of Israel, and said that Israeli leaders had already recognised that a Palestinian state should be formed.

    He said that while the Palestinians were entitled to the same rights as Israel, a future Palestinian state must be “effectively demilitarised” in order to guarantee Israel’s security.

    This is from a related story in the Washington Post

    Netanyahu sharply criticized Richard Goldstone — a former South African judge who carried out a probe for the U.N. Human Rights Council — for issuing a “biased and unjust” report accusing Israel and Hamas of committing war crimes, and he warned that the failure of governments to denounce the report could undercut U.S.-led efforts to pursue peace in the Middle East.

    “Will you stand with Israel or will you stand with the terrorists? We must know the answer to that question now,” he said. “Only if we have the confidence that we can defend ourselves can we take further risks for peace.”

    Netanyahu is very clear who he thinks the barbarous primitive fanatical terrorists are. Why should any nation denounce the report laying out the evidence that Israel committed war crimes in Gaza? How is it Israel is always the victim, so no matter what it does, it can blame those nasty suicide bombers or terrorists firing primitive rockets that once in awhile injure or kill Israeli civilians? Those are acts of terror and war crimes, but also the only means Palestinians have to fight back. Palestinians have no missiles, planes, white phosphorus, tanks, or other means of matching Israeli firepower, which is, thanks to USA, among the deadliest in the world. Israel never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and will not even acknowledge it has nuclear weapons. Netanyahu is basically demanding carte blanche to commit war crimes before Israel will take any risks for peace. Israel likes to call it self-defense, but their disproportionate responses are legendary. It has been argued that Israel deliberately provokes incidents so it can flex its military muscle. This UN report has become yet another excuse for Israel not to negotiate for peace in good faith.

    Netanyahu alludes to having accepted a state for Palestinians, but on what terms? He has rejected a halt to expansion of settlements, let alone dismantling them, despite the fact all those settlements are built on occupied territory and are hence illegal. Obama has given up insisting on a settlement freeze, which was obviously not going to happen, but at least Obama can say he tried. Netanyahu flat out rejects a return to the 1967 borders. Yet he demands recognition of the Jewish state, which basically means peace will only come on Israeli terms. This means the enemies of Israel would have to recognize whatever terms and borders Israel deems necessary for its security. This makes his statement of Palestinians having the same rights as Israelis completely absurd, but of course, that is the point.

  13. Aletha Says:
    October 2nd, 2009 at 10:40 pm

    Israel, with the help of USA, has effectively blackmailed the UN Human Rights Council into shelving its report, saying if the report were sent on to the General Assembly, Israel would not be likely to participate in peace talks. If there were any doubt whose intransigence is sabotaging any chance for peace, this should remove it. This story is from the Washington Post

    U.N. Panel Defers Vote On Gaza Report
    By Howard Schneider and Colum Lynch
    Washington Post Foreign Service
    Saturday, October 3, 2009

    JERUSALEM, Oct. 2 — The U.N. Human Rights Council on Friday shelved a controversial report on Israel’s recent war in the Gaza Strip, averting a crisis in the push to restart Israeli-Palestinian peace talks but potentially scuttling efforts to initiate broad war-crimes prosecutions over the conflict.

    Palestinian officials dropped their support for a scheduled Friday vote on the report after intense lobbying from the Obama administration, which argued that action on the study would “backfire” by driving Israel away from possible peace talks and strengthening opposition among Western countries worried about similar investigations of their soldiers.

    A fact-finding mission chaired by former South African judge Richard Goldstone concluded that there is evidence of war crimes by Israeli soldiers and Hamas fighters and said that if the two sides did not conduct independent investigations, the International Criminal Court should consider prosecutions. The government of Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu responded angrily that the panel’s findings undermined the right of nations to self-defense by playing down Hamas’s rocket attacks on Israel in the years before the three-week winter war.

    Israeli officials said this week that if the Geneva-based Human Rights Council forwarded the report to the U.N. General Assembly, the action would all but end hopes for restarting peace negotiations — a message reinforced by U.S. officials in talks with Palestinians.

    “The larger danger is that it legitimizes the Netanyahu argument that democratic states can’t be constrained in the way they fight terrorism — that enforcing respect for the rules is an inherent challenge to the right of self-defense,” Tom Malinowski, director of Human Rights Watch’s Washington office, said of the decision.

    While defusing an issue for Netanyahu’s government, the delay is a potential blow to the political standing of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

    The Palestinian leader is being pulled by Washington toward renewed negotiations despite the inability of Mitchell and Obama to coax Israel into agreeing to freeze the construction of Jewish settlements in the West Bank — a step Abbas felt would broaden Palestinian support for the talks. Along with his attendance at a meeting with Netanyahu in New York last week, the delay in action on the Goldstone report marks a second big accommodation to the United States.

    Why is the Obama Administration enabling Israeli war crimes? That is just one issue I have with this situation. Israel has no right to dictate the terms of peace talks, yet USA allows these shameless war crimes Israel calls self-defense to go without repercussions. Obama did mildly protest at the time, calling on Israel to exercise restraint. Big help that was. Israel has just been rewarded for flouting international law yet again.

    Even Human Rights Watch is soft-pedaling what Israel is doing. Israel has gone way beyond self-defense or fighting terrorism. Israel has engaged in its own brand of terrorism in the name of self-defense and fighting terrorism. USA has done likewise. Neither has any respect for the rules; whatever consideration USA had for rules of war went right out the window after 9/11/2001. One might have expected that to change after Republicans lost power, but that would be naive. As I have stated over and over, Obama and the Democrats are not about to be outdone in warmongering by Republicans. Democrats have a different style, but in substance and effect, their foreign policy is hard to distinguish. Israel has demonstrated how easy it was to call the Obama bluff of calling for a freeze on settlements. Obama wants to create the appearance of progress toward peace, so whatever conditions Israel wants to impose, USA will accommodate. If that means supporting Israel in its whitewashing of its war crimes, no problem.

  14. Aletha Says:
    October 8th, 2009 at 1:46 am

    Under intense pressure from his people, Abbas has reversed himself, supporting a Libyan proposal for an emergency Security Council meeting to discuss the Goldstone report. This story is from Al Jazeera

    UN to address Gaza war report

    The UN Security Council has agreed to hold a discussion next week on a report that accuses Israel of war crimes during its war against Gaza in December.

    The council on Wednesday agreed to discuss a request by Libya that an emergency meeting be held on the report, which was authored by a panel chaired by Richard Goldstone, a South African judge.

    The council voted to bring forward its monthly meeting on the Middle East by six days, to October 14.

    The talks will focus on the Goldstone report, which accuses Israel of using disproportionate force and deliberately harming civilians and which also alleges that Hamas fired rockets indiscriminately at civilians in southern Israel.

    Israel and Hamas have denied the allegations contained in the report.

    Anger at Abbas

    The council’s move comes amid public anger among Palestinians over the support from Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president and head of Fatah, that action be suspended in regard to the Goldstone report’s findings.

    Hundreds of posters appeared in public areas around Gaza City on Wednesday criticising Abbas.

    Abbas is accused of backing the postponement of a UN Human Rights Council vote in Geneva last Friday that would have condemned Israel’s failure to co-operate with a UN investigation into the December-January war.

    Such a vote would have been one of many steps to bring Israel before a war crimes tribunal, something many Palestinians want to see.

    Ayman Mohyeldin, Al Jazeera’s correspondent in Gaza, said: “There’s no doubt the public outrage over the decision by the PA to withdraw support for the Goldstone report continues several days after that decision.

    “We saw today some of the more powerful images of the people here in Gaza turning against the Palestinian Authority president.”

    He said a rally was held and that dozens of people – mostly intellectuals as well as university students, some of whom were relatives of the victims of the Gaza war – attended.

    “During the course of that rally, we heard some very strong condemnation of the PA president,” he said.

    ‘Offensive gesture’

    “We saw a very offensive public gesture. Many of them had taken off their
    shoes and slapped the posters of the Palestinian president.”

    Yasser Abed Rabbo, Abbas’s senior adviser, told the Voice of Palestine radio that backing the postponement of the UN human rights council vote was “a mistake”.

    “We have the courage to admit there was a mistake,” he said, but added that the situation “can be repaired”.

    Palestinians, including members of Fatah, Abbas’s party, have strongly criticised the Goldstone vote postponement, holding him responsible for the decision.

    Nothing meaningful is expected to come out of the Security Council meeting, since USA holds veto power, but it is an interesting development that Abbas would change his position under pressure. He has been accused many times of selling out his people, being too willing to compromise with Israel and USA on matters most Palestinians consider non-negotiable. Because of that, Israel and USA have used him to isolate Hamas, painting him as a moderate they can deal with, as opposed to Hamas, styling it a terrorist organization that deserves no place at the negotiating table. Abbas went so far as to use his security forces to quell demonstrations against the Gaza invasion.

  15. Aletha Says:
    October 16th, 2009 at 10:27 pm

    The UN Human Rights Council has endorsed the Goldstone report, infuriating Israel and disappointing USA. This story is from Associated Press

    UN rights council endorses Gaza war crimes report
    By FRANK JORDANS (AP) – 9 hours ago

    GENEVA — The U.N. Human Rights Council voted Friday to endorse a Gaza war crimes report that calls on Israel and Hamas to carry out credible investigations into alleged abuses — or face possible referral to international war crimes prosecutors.

    The move — which was opposed by six nations, including the United States — means Israel could find itself facing a request at the U.N. Security Council to refer the case to prosecutors at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, a move likely to be blocked by Washington.

    Still, Friday’s decision could have far-reaching implications for the way the global body deals with war crimes claims, experts said.

    It also keeps attention on the report, compiled by an expert panel chaired by respected South African jurist Richard Goldstone, just as President Barack Obama tries to restart the Middle East peace process. Almost 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed during the Dec. 27-Jan. 18 conflict.

    The 575-page document concluded that Israel used disproportionate force, deliberately targeted civilians, used Palestinians as human shields and destroyed civilian infrastructure during its incursion into the Gaza Strip to root out Palestinian rocket squads.

    It also accused Palestinian armed groups including Hamas, which controls Gaza, of deliberately targeting civilians and trying to spread terror through years of rocket attacks on southern Israel.

    The report recommends that the 15-member Security Council require both sides in the conflict to show within six months that they are carrying out independent and impartial investigations into alleged abuses.

    If they are not, the matter should be referred to prosecutors at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands, the report says.

    In order to be adopted, a U.N. Security Council resolution must get nine yes votes, and not be vetoed by a permanent member. The U.S. is likely to use its veto to block any call to get the International Criminal Court involved in the dispute over Gaza or to take action against Israel.

    M. Cherif Bassiouni, a professor of Law at DePaul University College of Law in Chicago and one of the driving forces behind the creation of the International Criminal Court, said that, whatever happens to the report, the decision by the Rights Council has already set a precedent.

    “If it sends the report to the Security Council, to the Secretary-General and to the General Assembly, it is sending it not for general informational purposes but for action,” he said.

    Arab and African countries will likely point to any U.S. efforts to block referral to the international court as an example of double standards, since it was Western countries that referred Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir to the International Criminal Court in March for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes, said Bassiouni.

    Israel’s foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, warned before the vote that it could have far-reaching consequences.

    “Whoever votes in favor of endorsing the report must understand that next time it will be the soldiers and officers of NATO in Afghanistan, and then Russian soldiers and officers in Chechnya (who face prosecution),” Lieberman said late Thursday.

    Israeli foreign ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said the resolution “provides encouragement for terrorist organizations worldwide and undermines global peace.”

    U.S. diplomat Douglas M. Griffiths told the council that Washington was disappointed with the outcome, in which the report was endorsed by a vote of 25-6. The United States and five European countries — Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Slovakia and Ukraine _opposed the resolution, while 11 mostly European and African countries abstained. Britain, France and three other members of the 47-nation body declined to vote. Russia and China, two permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, were among those voting yes.

    “We’re focused on moving forward in the peace process and we feel that this is a distraction from that,” Griffiths told The Associated Press.

    In Washington, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters the resolution had “an unbalanced focus and we’re concerned that it will exacerbate polarization and divisiveness.”

    Israel has said continuing focus on its actions in the Gaza conflict could derail what should be seen as the more important efforts to restart talks toward a peace deal and the establishment of a Palestinian state.

    Yes, Israel will use this as yet another excuse why a peace deal is not possible. US State Dept. is desperately trying to save face. This is not a distraction from the peace process, rather its death knell, as if Israel had any interest in making peace regardless. The resolution may indeed exacerbate tensions, since pressure put on a rogue state like Israel to comply with international law is never taken gracefully. Israel consistently denounces UN resolutions, accusing the international body of everything from anti-Semitism to condemning Israel for acting in self-defense. Israeli war crimes have now been finally condemned in a way Israel may not be able to dismiss so easily. USA will do its best to protect Israel from any consequences, which will shatter the illusion of being an impartial broker for peace which Obama has assiduously crafted. Israel may be correct that NATO actions in Afghanistan may come under similar scrutiny, but this does not mean that scrutiny would not be justified. Israel got more support than I expected, but persists in portraying itself as the victim of terrorism. Its sense of isolation and paranoia is likely to result in an attack on Iran. Israel would defend that as necessary to preempt a nuclear attack by Iran, but no matter how much Israel may fear Iranian nuclear ambitions, such a preemptive strike will certainly backfire, with horrible consequences for Israel and its allies, if not a new World War.

  16. Aletha Says:
    October 22nd, 2009 at 11:47 pm

    Goldstone has challenged the Obama Administration to show him the flaws in his report. Needless to say, no answer has been forthcoming. This story is from Haaretz

    Goldstone tells Obama: Show me flaws in Gaza report
    Last update – 16:58 22/10/2009
    By Jack Khoury, Haaretz Correspondent, and Haaretz Service

    South African jurist Richard Goldstone, who led a damning United Nations probe into Israel’s offensive in the Gaza Strip last winter, has challenged Barack Obama’s administration to justify its claims that the report is one-sided and flawed.

    Goldstone’s report, commissioned by the UN Human Rights Council, accuses both Israel and Hamas of war crimes in the Gaza offensive. Israel has rejected the report as biased and the U.S. has said it would support Israel’s efforts to prevent a UN Security Council debate on the report.

    Goldstone told Al Jazeera on Thursday that he is still waiting for the U.S. to clarify its claim that the report has a number of flaws.

    “The Obama administration joined our recommendation calling for full and good-faith investigations, both in Israel and in Gaza, but said that the report was flawed,” Goldstone told Al Jazeera.

    The commission chair said that once Washington points out the flaws, he would be ready to respond. “I have yet to hear from the Obama administration what the flaws in the report that they have identified are. I would be happy to respond to them, if and when I know what they are,” he said.

    Meanwhile, a recent poll shows that more than two-thirds of the Israeli public opposes an Israeli inquiry panel into the events of Operation Cast Lead.

    On Wednesday night, 30 Sderot residents arrived at the UN offices in Jerusalem to personally pass on a petition opposing the Goldstone report, signed by 100 thousand people from around the world.

    The Sderot residents stood outside the UN offices holding signs saying “Goldstone apologize” and “We’re sick of anti-Semites”.

    Richard Goldstone has nothing to apologize for, and the accusation of anti-Semitism is absurd on its face. What, is he another of those self-hating Jews? His report was denounced by US authorities for purely political reasons. They will be hard pressed to specify any flaws, since the primary flaw in the report is being critical of Israel. Israeli officials are not about to come clean about their tactics in Gaza. Their investigation was a predictable whitewash, a sham to create the impression of concern over the accusations of war crimes. Israel pretends its investigation exonerated its “most moral army in the world.”

    If Obama truly wants progress toward peace, he has to be a real honest broker, not a politician playing games like insisting Israel stop expanding its settlements, only to back down when Netanyahu called his bluff. This intentionally vague condemnation of the “deeply flawed” Goldstone report, while pressuring Mahmoud Abbas to to withdraw support for the report, is another game. Abbas had to apologize for his mistake. Obama should do likewise, but I am not holding my breath. That would be political suicide, though if the US media had an ounce of even-handedness in its coverage of Israel, that might not be the case. Israel protests too much. Its constant refrain of how unfair, biased, anti-Semitic the UN is should be a big clue. The UN is not bound by US political realities, so it is not bound to defend Israel no matter what it does. Israel has a great deal to answer for, and all its protestations of only acting in self-defense will not change the facts. War crimes are never required for self-defense, though they are usually mischaracterized as necessary self-defense. Propaganda to defend war crimes is nothing new, nor the exclusive province of Israel. Israel is correct to observe that NATO might face prosecution for its actions in Afghanistan, since war crimes abound in that occupation as well. If that is motivating Obama to go along with the Israeli whitewash, shame on him. However, I think it is more likely that Obama does not have the nerve to confront Israel over its war crimes. He did call on Israel to stop expanding the settlements, but that did not require much nerve, since he must have known Netanyahu would not comply.

  17. Aletha Says:
    November 6th, 2009 at 1:26 am

    The United Nations has approved the Goldstone report. Israel denounced this vote, coming on the heels of its interception of an arms shipment allegedly sent from Iran for Hezbollah, as “completely detached from realities.” Really, Israel? Who is denying reality? This story is from Haaretz

    Israel: UN ‘detached from reality’ for adopting Goldstone report
    By Shlomo Shamir, Haaretz Correspondent and News Agencies
    Last update – 08:52 06/11/2009

    Israel on Friday rejected a United Nations General Assembly resolution urging an investigation into a report saying war crimes were committed in Gaza, and condemned the world body vote as “completely detached from realities”.

    In a statement, the Foreign Ministry said in response to Thursday’s vote that Israel “maintains the right to self-defense”, and would “continue to act to protect the lives of its citizens from the threat of international terrorism”.

    The resolution, endorsing a report on the Gaza war commissioned by the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council, was nonbinding and seen as unlikely to force either Israel or Islamist Hamas rulers in Gaza to investigate the findings. But Israel has responded with outrage to the findings issued in September by a panel led by South African jurist Richard Goldstone, seeing the document as an Arab bid to undermine the reputations of its military and political leaders.

    “Israel rejects the resolution of the U.N. General Assembly, which is completely detached from realities on the ground that Israel must face,” the Foreign Ministry statement issued by spokesman Yigal Palmor said.

    Palmor also maintained that Israel had “demonstrated higher military and moral standards than each and every one of this resolution’s instigators”, during the war in December in which more than 1,300 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed.

    The 192-member General Assembly adopted the resolution Thursday by a vote of 114-18, with others absent or abstaining. The resolution calls on the Security Council to act if either side fails to launch credible investigations within three months.

    The report on the Gaza war was drafted by an expert UN panel chaired by South African Judge Richard Goldstone, and concluded that both Israel and Palestinian militants committed war crimes and possible crimes against humanity.

    The harshly worded UN draft resolution, composed by Arab member states, has not been softened despite U.S. and European efforts.

    Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Gabriela Shalev, told Haaretz before the vote that she did not plan to take part. “I won’t lend a hand to a debate whose conclusions are predetermined. It was a predictable Arab game.”

    However, Israel and the United States were among those voting against the resolution. A total of 44 countries abstained.

    The resolution enjoyed wide support among the Non-Aligned Movement bloc and the Arab bloc. These states comprise an automatic majority of 120 votes.

    The draft resolution includes a demand for the Israeli government to carry out an “independent and credible” internal investigation of its own conduct during Israel’s 3-week offensive in Gaza, which left over 1,000 Palestinians dead.

    Hamas is not mentioned by name in the UN draft resolution. Instead, it calls on the “Palestinian side” to carry out an investigation into the Goldstone report findings that relate to Palestinians.

    The draft resolution also includes a recommendation to convene the signatories of the fourth Geneva Convention treaty for an emergency session to discuss Israel’s violations of the treaty.

    Apart from Israel and the United States, a number of European countries including Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and the Czech Republic voted against the resolution. But the European Union was split, with others including Britain and France abstaining. Most developing countries voted in favor.

    Israel’s Deputy Ambassador Daniel Carmon told the assembly the resolution “endorses and legitimizes a deeply flawed, one-sided and prejudiced report of the discredited Human Rights Council and its politicized work that bends both fact and law.”

    U.S. Deputy Ambassador Alejandro Wolff said the resolution was flawed in several respects, including its failure to name the Hamas militant movement that rules Gaza. He also said a demand for international supervision of any Israeli and Palestinian investigations was “unhelpful.”

    Israeli propaganda will not bend facts. Israel has tried to spin its way out of international condemnation of its tactics during the Gaza invasion ever since it started. There is no way those tactics were required for self-defense. Israel has been hiding behind that excuse since the state came into existence. Israel always exaggerates the threats it is facing. All nations have enemies, but most learn to live and let live. Israel and USA have decided their enemies can be killed on a whim, hiding behind the rationale of self-defense against terrorism. When a nation commits war crimes, there is no excuse, no moral high ground, no escaping the reality of having crossed the line. The old saying, two wrongs do not make a right, is a lesson these international scofflaws need to learn. Stooping to the level of terrorism does not qualify as self-defense, especially when a nation possesses overwhelming military superiority, as Israel and USA do over their enemies.

    What is this nonsense about international supervision being unhelpful? Is Mr. Wolff suggesting Israel can be trusted to investigate its actions? Israel has already conducted an investigation, concluding it did nothing wrong. Is that kind of investigation supposed to be helpful? In the minds of US diplomats, perhaps it is. After the spectacle of Secretary of State Clinton praising the offer by Netanyahu to slow down the construction of West Bank settlements as unprecedented, which may have been the last straw for Mahmoud Abbas, now threatening not to run for reelection, it is really difficult to make the argument that USA is any kind of honest broker, let alone an impartial mediator.

  18. Aletha Says:
    February 1st, 2010 at 11:10 pm

    Finally, Israel has concluded its most moral army on earth did something wrong! Two senior army officers have been reprimanded for firing white phosphorus artillery shells at a UN compound in Gaza. This story is from the Times of London

    Israeli officers get ‘slap on wrist’ for white phosphorus use in Gaza
    February 2, 2010

    Israel has reprimanded two senior army officers who were responsible for firing white phosphorus artillery shells at a UN compound during last year’s offensive in Gaza.

    In the first admission of any wrongdoing the Israeli military found that Brigadier-General Eyal Eisenberg and Colonel Ilan Malka were guilty “of exceeding their authority in a manner that jeopardised the lives of others”.

    The Israeli report was in response to a damning UN investigation into the Gaza war, which concluded that both Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian group, had committed war crimes and possible crimes against humanity and which called on both sides to investigate the conduct of their forces.

    An Israeli defence official said that its internal investigation could lead to further disciplinary action against soldiers involved in the 22-day offensive. The two officers disciplined yesterday were served a mild reprimand and had a “note” placed in their personal files noting their involvement. One defence official described the punishment as a “slap on the wrist.”

    The artillery attack by 155mm cannon, which took place while more than 700 Palestinian civilians were taking refuge inside, set light to a warehouse storing millions of dollars’ worth of aid for more than a million Gazans and destroyed tonnes of food and supplies.

    A high-ranking UN official told The Times that half a dozen unexploded IDF shells were found in the UN compound and their serial numbers were traced to US factories. “The burning down of the UN compound in Gaza is massively symbolic,” said Chris Gunness, a UN spokesman.

    Human rights groups have accused Israel of violating the rules of warfare in Gaza.

    Although white phosphorus is not mentioned in the officers’ reprimands, the Israeli report reveals elsewhere that the munitions were in use. The shells disperse hundreds of pieces of felt soaked in the incendiary chemical, which continues to burn for as long as it is exposed to oxygen.

    The IDF report said: “The primary rationale for deploying smoke screening munitions containing white phosphorus was to produce a smokescreen to protect Israeli forces from the Hamas anti-tank crews operating adjacent to the UNRWA headquarters. Such a smokescreen has proven an effective response to the anti-tank threat, since it effectively blocks the enemy’s field of view . . . The smokescreen created during the fighting in Tel al-Hawa was effective in achieving its military objective.” It concluded: “In the absence of the smokescreen, the fight would have continued in this area, and the IDF would have had to use reactive fire to engage anti-tank units, with the likelihood of greater civilian harm.”

    UN officials argue that the use of white phosphorus caused millions of dollars in damage and could have led to a “great loss of life”.

    I would say committing war crimes is a good deal more serious than exceeding authority, but Israel is defending the indefensible to the last. There are other means of creating a smokescreen that could have been used without inflicting such punishment on innocent bystanders, but that was the last thing on the minds of these officers. They wanted to burn down that UN building, and their superiors probably gave them the green light. The Israeli army, despite its protestations, is not known for its restraint. These officers may make a convenient scapegoat to cover up for their superiors, but the results of the Israeli investigation so far are not at all satisfactory. Heads should roll, but it appears not even these officers will suffer more than this symbolic slap on the wrist.

  19. Aletha Says:
    June 2nd, 2010 at 10:57 pm

    Israel just cannot stop itself from committing war crimes, which it calls self-defense. This time Israel killed Turks trying to bring supplies to Gaza, boarding one of the vessels in a peculiarly bungled fashion, that one might have expected would provide an excuse for Israel to shed some blood. This story is from Reuters

    Activists describe “bloodbath” on Gaza-bound ship
    (Reuters) – Freed after days held incommunicado in Israeli jail, survivors of Monday’s storming of an aid ship described a “bloodbath,” with people shot before their eyes and desperate efforts to treat the wounded.

    There were sharp differences in accounts: activists accused Israeli troops of war crimes, while Israel held to its line that they fired in self-defense. In one of the key differences, activists denied Israeli accusations that they fired first, with guns they had seized from Israeli troops in the melee.

    All sides described a scene of confusion and mayhem in the botched assault.

    “People had been shot in the arms, legs, in the head — everywhere. We had so many injured. It was a bloodbath,” said Laura Stuart, a British housewife and first aider.

    FOUR ISRAELIS CAPTURED IN FIRST WAVE

    Andre Abu Khalil, a Lebanese cameraman for Al Jazeera TV, gave an account that backed some of what both sides have said.

    In his telling, activists initially wounded and captured four Israelis from a first wave that boarded the ship. A second wave of troops tried to storm the ship after the four were taken below decks.

    “Twenty Turkish men formed a human shield to prevent the Israeli soldiers from scaling the ship. They had slingshots, water pipes and sticks,” he said. “They were banging the pipes on the side of the ship to warn the Israelis not to get closer.”

    After a 10-minute standoff the Israelis opened fire.

    “One man got a direct hit to the head and another one was shot in the neck,” he said. In all he saw some 40 people wounded, some to the legs, eye, stomach and chest.

    One activist used a loudhailer to tell the Israelis the four captive soldiers were well and would be released if they provided medical help for the wounded activists. With an Israeli Arab lawmaker acting as mediator, the Israelis agreed. Wounded were brought to the deck and were airlifted off the ship.

    Israel says its troops fired only after some of their weapons had been seized by activists, who fired first.

    “Once the soldiers saw knives, metal rods, chains, broken bottles, and they were shot at, they shot back and killed nine of them,” Israeli military spokesman Captain Ayre Shalicar said.

    ACTIVISTS DENY FIRING

    One of the organizers on board who returned on Thursday from an Israeli jail, Bulent Yildirim, chairman of the Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief (IHH), said activists had indeed seized weapons, but never fired them.

    “They were trying to land on the boat. So obviously there was this hand-to-hand combat and during that process the people on the boat were basically able to disarm some of the soldiers because they did have guns with them,” Burney told Reuters.

    Asked if anyone had used the guns against the Israeli commandos, he said: “No, not at all.”

    Canadian Farooq Burney, director of a Qatari educational initiative, said the commandos waited more than an hour before treating the wounded, even though activists had made a makeshift sign reading: “S.O.S. .. Please provide medical assistance.”

    The 37-year-old Canadian said he witnessed one elderly man bleed to death before his eyes after being shot.

    “He just passed out in front of us and we couldn’t see where he was hit so we opened up his lifejacket and we could clearly see that he was hit in the chest,” Burney said. “He was losing a lot of blood. It was on … the right, just close to his chest and there was blood coming out from there. He passed away.”

    The nine dead activists, who were brought home on Thursday in wooden coffins, were all Turks, including one dual U.S.-Turkish citizen. Yildirim said some activists were still missing, adding that an Indonesian doctor was shot in the stomach as he helped a wounded Israeli soldier.

    “I took off my shirt and waved it, as a white flag. We thought they would stop after seeing the white flag, but they continued killing people,” Yildirim said. “A friend of ours saw two dead bodies in a toilet.”

    British activist Sarah Colborne, of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, said she was on deck when commandos approached in boats, “bristling with arms.” Others roped down from hovering helicopters and sound and gas bombs were let off.

    “It looked like they were capable of killing anyone. They had obviously been fired up,” the 43-year-old told reporters.

    Israel is sticking to its guns, insisting the blockade is necessary for security. This story is from the Guardian

    Binyamin Netanyahu defiant over pressure on Israel to lift siege of Gaza
    Ian Black, Middle East editor
    The Guardian, Thursday 3 June 2010

    Israel’s prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, rejected criticism of its blockade of the Gaza Strip last night, saying the measures were necessary to prevent missile attacks against Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

    Rejecting demands to lift the closure of the Gaza Strip amid widespread international outrage over this week’s violent interception of an aid flotilla, Netanyahu said on Israeli television that easing controls would put long-range Iranian missiles into the hands of Hamas.

    This threatened not just Israel but Europe, he said. “Once again, Israel faces hypocrisy and a biased rush to judgment,” Netanyahu said. “The international community cannot afford an Iranian port on the Mediterranean … The same countries that are criticising us today, should know that they could be targeted tomorrow.”

    Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, lined up with the UN on Tuesday when she used tough language calling the Israeli blockade “unsustainable and unacceptable” – hours after Egypt announced it was opening its only crossing point into the coastal territory.

    Cameron and Hague referred to UN security council resolution 1860, which calls “for the unimpeded provision and distribution throughout Gaza of humanitarian assistance, including food, fuel and medical treatment”. Hague said it was “a tragedy” it had not been implemented when it was passed after last year’s Gaza war, in which some 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed.

    The UK is watching closely to see if the aid on the flotilla is delivered to Gaza, as the Israelis originally promised it would be. Israel said yesterday that Hamas had prevented deliveries of medication, clothing, blankets, medical equipment and toys found on the ships.

    “Resolution 1860 is waiting to be implemented,” John Ging of UNWRA, the UN aid agency for Palestinian refugees, told the Guardian. “We get hundreds of tons of food and medical supplies in every day. There’s the blueprint. It shows that there is integrity in the supply chain.” Experts are now looking at ways to monitor the entry of goods into Gaza to satisfy Israeli security concerns. Israel will also be asked to clarify what exactly it bans. Items that are currently proscribed include foodstuffs and writing materials. Israel describes such curbs on imports as “a central pillar in the means at the disposal of the state of Israel in the armed conflict between it and Hamas”.

    Sometimes I wonder if Israel even cares how absurd its rationalizations sound. Certain foodstuffs and writing materials are prohibited as a central pillar of the war on Hamas? Megan McArdle, the business and economics editor for The Atlantic, posted a partial list of items Israel prohibits and permits.
    Prohibited item list

    Ms. McArdle quotes Peter Beinart explaining the true motives behind all this:

    The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations greeted news of the flotilla disaster by repeating a common “pro-Israel” talking point: that Israel only blockades Gaza to prevent Hamas from building rockets that might kill Israeli citizens. If only that were true. In reality, the embargo has a broader and more sinister purpose: to impoverish the people of Gaza, and thus turn them against Hamas. As the Israeli newspaper Haaretz has reported, the Israeli officials in charge of the embargo adhere to what they call a policy of “no prosperity, no development, no humanitarian crisis.” In other words, the embargo must be tight enough to keep the people of Gaza miserable, but not so tight that they starve.

    This explains why Israel prevents Gazans from importing, among other things, cilantro, sage, jam, chocolate, French fries, dried fruit, fabrics, notebooks, empty flowerpots and toys, none of which are particularly useful in building Kassam rockets. It’s why Israel bans virtually all exports from Gaza, a policy that has helped to destroy the Strip’s agriculture, contributed to the closing of some 95 percent of its factories, and left more 80 percent of its population dependent on food aid. It’s why Gaza’s fishermen are not allowed to travel more than three miles from the coast, which dramatically reduces their catch. And it’s why Israel prevents Gazan students from studying in the West Bank, a policy recently denounced by 10 winners of the prestigious Israel Prize. There’s a name for all this: collective punishment.

    This is indeed collective punishment. It cannot be justified as necessary for Israeli security. Does Israel actually expect anyone to believe that if the siege of Gaza were lifted, Hamas would present a threat to Europe? Or that the international outcry is a hypocritical rush to judgment? If this were not such a deadly serious matter, I would think Netanyahu was trying to be funny! No such luck. Israel has no intention of complying with international law, and will break it any time it feels like it. Already it is shadowing another vessel bringing supplies to Gaza, the Rachel Corrie, named after a US citizen deliberately mowed down by an Israeli bulldozer, because she had the nerve to stand in the way of the demolition of Palestinian homes. Israel has no intention of allowing any breach of its siege, so there may be another deadly confrontation, though Israel claims it does not intend this ship any harm. Apparently this latest incident was even too much for Hillary Clinton, but it remains to be seen whether that was more than a token protest. USA could certainly put pressure on Israel to lift the siege, but I am not holding my breath, especially in an election year.

  20. Aletha Says:
    June 7th, 2010 at 11:06 pm

    Helen Thomas has called it quits, because of the furor that erupted when she told a rabbi Israeli Jews should “get the hell out of Palestine.” Ms. Thomas is of Lebanese Arab descent, so in light of recent developments, her angry remarks make more sense than the denunciations of some of her attackers who have never appreciated her point of view. She has expressed her regrets, but there is no mollifying her critics, who are acting like sharks smelling blood. It is a sad day when a courageous trailblazer like her feels compelled to resign because she expresses some angry sentiments about war criminals who happen to be considered good allies of this country. Yes, her comments were offensive, but not hard to understand about those who kill her people with impunity. Perhaps Robert Gibbs, denouncing her remarks as “offensive and reprehensible,” thought he should overlook what Israel recently did to Lebanon, which I consider far more offensive and reprehensible than Helen Thomas fuming about the most recent demonstration of Israeli war crimes. This story is from the Washington Post

    Helen Thomas never shied from piping up. In the end, that was the problem.
    By Howard Kurtz
    Washington Post Staff Writer
    Tuesday, June 8, 2010

    Helen Thomas ended a storied career at the White House dating from the Kennedy era on Monday, days after making inflammatory remarks on Israel to a rabbi with a video camera.

    “Frankly, I was shocked,” said Rabbi David Nesenoff, who was at the White House for a Jewish heritage celebration on May 27 and simply asked the Hearst Newspapers columnist, “Any comments on Israel?” Her response — that Israeli Jews should “get the hell out of Palestine” and “go home” to Germany, Poland and America — triggered a wave of denunciations that a narrowly worded apology did little to quell.

    “This was vile, a paradigm of hate talk,” said Nesenoff, who was accompanied by his 17-year-old son and a friend. “She felt comfortable saying this in front of two boys with yarmulkes on.”

    While the 89-year-old Thomas is renowned as a trailblazer who aggressively questioned 10 presidents — including President Obama, whom she pressed last month on Afghanistan — her hostility toward Israel has been no secret within the Beltway. Though she gave up her correspondent’s job a decade ago, she retained her front-row briefing-room seat, even as colleagues sometimes rolled their eyes at her obvious biases.

    “She asked questions no hard-news reporter would ask, that carried an agenda and reflected her point of view, and there were some reporters who felt that was inappropriate,” said CBS correspondent Mark Knoller. “As a columnist she felt totally unbound from any of the normal policies of objectivity that every other reporter in the room felt compelled to abide by, and sometimes her questions were embarrassing to other reporters.”

    But few called her out for such conduct — until Nesenoff, who heads a Long Island synagogue, posted the video on his site RabbiLIVE.com. Commentators on the right and left quickly eviscerated Thomas.

    “She’s always said crazy stuff,” said National Review Online columnist Jonah Goldberg. “One reason she gets a pass is that there’s an entrenched system of deference to seniority in the White House press corps. . . . This newfound horror and dismay that people are expressing about Helen Thomas are beyond a day late and a dollar short.”

    Jeffrey Goldberg, an Atlantic reporter who specializes in the Middle East, said: “Helen Thomas offered the official Hamas position, as far as I can tell. There’s a level of insensitivity that’s almost comical in what she said, to tell Jews to go back to Germany, where things worked out so well for them.”

    Thomas told a Washington Post reporter Friday night that she was “very sorry” and had “made a mistake,” but did not address the substance of her comments. By Monday morning — after her agent had dropped her, Hearst expressed deep regret over her remarks and White House press secretary Robert Gibbs called them “offensive and reprehensible” — she decided to call it quits. Thomas, the daughter of Lebanese immigrants, said in a statement that her comments “do not reflect my heartfelt belief that peace will come to the Middle East only when all parties recognize the need for mutual respect and tolerance.”

    In 2000, when Thomas resigned from United Press International after it was bought by News World Communications, a company controlled by officials of the Unification Church, Dan Rather called her “a hero of journalism.”

    During George W. Bush’s administration, Thomas became an icon for some liberals who applauded her outspoken opposition to the Iraq invasion and cast her as tougher than the reporters who failed to skeptically question the march to war. Ari Fleischer, who was Bush’s first press secretary, led the campaign for her ouster over the weekend, e-mailing journalists who might have missed her remarks.

    In 2002, Thomas asked Fleischer: “Does the president think that the Palestinians have a right to resist 35 years of brutal military occupation and suppression?”

    Four years later, Thomas told Fleischer’s successor, Tony Snow, that the United States “could have stopped the bombardment of Lebanon” by Israel, but instead had “gone for collective punishment against all of Lebanon and Palestine.” Snow tartly thanked her for “the Hezbollah view.”

    Mark Rabin, a former freelance cameraman for CNN, said that in a 2002 conversation at the White House, Thomas said “thank God for Hezbollah” for driving Israel out of Lebanon, adding that “Israel is the cause for 99 percent of all this terrorism.”

    At Bethesda’s Walt Whitman High School, where Thomas agreed to withdraw Sunday as a speaker at graduation, one student had created a Facebook page objecting to the choice. After the cancellation, other students started a group, which drew nearly 100 fans, titled “Helen Thomas should have been our graduation speaker.” One of the creators of that group, Andrew Beehler, said that “the vast majority of the school” was in favor of the Thomas appearance, but that school leaders sided with a small group of vocal parents and students who threatened to protest at graduation.

    Sam Donaldson, a former White House correspondent for ABC, said Thomas was a “pioneer” for women, “and no one can take that away from Helen.” While not defending her comments on Israel, he said they likely reflect the view of many people of Arab descent.

    Thank you, Mr. Donaldson, for that voice of reason. Some of these circling sharks ought to think twice about throwing stones at Helen Thomas, about how they might feel about a rogue state killing their kinfolk without regard for international law or any other consideration besides paranoid delusions of what is necessary to ensure its security, shielded by their own country. But these critics will not think twice; they are lapdogs of the political establishment, and probably have been waiting for just such a moment to crucify Helen Thomas. Speaking for those with free and independent minds, she will be sorely missed.

  21. Aletha Says:
    June 16th, 2010 at 11:18 pm

    Congress has no shame, calling a news conference to denounce Turkey for supporting the raided flotilla of aid ships! I suppose they want to demonstrate that Israel does not stand alone in the court of world opinion, US legislators want it to be known they stand behind Israel, regardless of what it does in its fruitless quest to crush Hamas! This story is from Reuters

    U.S. lawmakers rap Turkey for its stance on Israel
    (Reuters) – U.S. lawmakers warned Turkey on Wednesday that its ties with Washington would suffer if it continued on what they considered an anti-Israel path.

    “There will be a cost if Turkey stays on its present heading of growing closer to Iran and more antagonistic to the state of Israel,” Representative Mike Pence, the No. 3 Republican in the U.S. House of Representatives, said.

    At a news conference, Republicans and Democrats denounced NATO ally Turkey for supporting an aid convoy of ships that recently tried to run the Israeli blockade of Gaza.

    The lawmakers also criticized Turkey’s opposition to a recent U.N. Security Council resolution extending punitive sanctions on Iran for its secretive nuclear program. The U.N. resolution was strongly backed by Washington, which suspects Iran of trying to develop atomic bombs.

    Democratic Representative Eliot Engel called Turkey’s actions “disgraceful,” adding that although Ankara was a member of NATO, it had stopped looking westward.

    The lawmakers said on Wednesday that 126 members of the House of Representatives had signed a letter urging President Obama to oppose international condemnation of Israel over its role in seizing the aid ships last month and forcing them to dock in Israeli ports.

    Nine people were killed aboard one vessel, the Turkish-registered Mavi Mara, provoking an international outcry. Israel says its commandos acted in self-defense.

    One pro-Israel lobby group in Washington, J Street, took a different view, suggesting some lawmakers’ statements about the Gaza flotilla were “drafted primarily for domestic political consumption” instead of advancing Middle East peace.

    The group’s president Jeremy Ben-Ami urged U.S. lawmakers to express “more nuanced views of the situation that might emphasize the urgency of American leadership to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through two states.”

    Nuance? There are no nuances as far as these posturing politicians are concerned, Israel can do no wrong! The actions of Israel, and its enabler USA, are the disgrace, but since neither has any respect for world opinion or international law, that is lost in the haze of propaganda that Israel must do whatever it deems necessary to fight terrorism. One might have hoped that would have changed under Obama, but only the rhetoric has changed, not the policies that matter. Never mind that Israel just engaged in an act of terrorism against a member of NATO; terrorism is in the eye of the beholder, only considered terrorism when committed by the enemy.

    Much is made of the refusal of Hamas to recognize Israel, ignoring the fact that would be tantamount to recognizing the legitimacy of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands. Israel likes to claim Hamas is dedicated to the destruction of Israel, therefore the blockade is necessary and just. Is Israel not dedicated to the destruction of Hamas, the democratically elected government of Gaza? Oppressors always reverse the truth to hide from reality. As long as the only superpower enables this illegal and brutal behavior, rationalized by paranoia and some divinely bestowed right to rule Palestine with an iron fist, Israel feels free to do as it sees fit to crush the resistance to its occupation. No matter how hollow that makes the rhetoric of peace sound, Israel claims it must act against anything it conceives might be a threat, even a shipment of humanitarian aid.

  22. Aletha Says:
    August 2nd, 2010 at 11:02 pm

    Israel must be feeling the heat; it has agreed to cooperate with a UN investigation of the flotilla raid. This story is from Associated Press

    Israeli about-face: agrees to UN probe of flotilla
    By MARK LAVIE (AP) – 9 hours ago

    JERUSALEM — Israel agreed Monday to participate in a U.N. investigation of its deadly raid on a Gaza-bound flotilla last spring, a surprising departure from its traditional distrust of the world body.

    Israel expressed confidence the inquiry would find its actions justified. However, its decision to cooperate reflects the hit Israel’s world standing has taken in the wake of the assault and the spotlight it turned on its three-year blockade of already impoverished Gaza.

    U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed hope the panel would meet the Security Council’s call for a “prompt, impartial, credible and transparent investigation” of the May 31 confrontation in which nine Turkish activists, including one with U.S. citizenship, died after being shot by Israeli commandos boarding their ship.

    U.N. officials said their inquiry would not be a court-like tribunal, and it was not clear whether it would even call its own witnesses. Instead, its mandate is to oversee the separate investigations now under way by Israel and Turkey and determine if they are credible.

    Israel’s sudden acceptance of a U.N. inquiry counters decades of suspicion of the world body because of its routine near-unanimous votes against the Jewish state in the General Assembly.

    The last time Israel cooperated with a U.N. probe was in 2000, when the U.N. drew the boundary between Israel and Lebanon after Israel’s withdrawal from south Lebanon following its 18-year occupation.

    Israel said it would send a representative to sit on the panel and would furnish reports from its own inquiry, but ruled out allowing soldiers or military officers to testify.

    “Israel has nothing to hide. The opposite is true,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement. “It is in Israel’s national interest to ensure that the factual truth about the entire flotilla incident will be made public, and that is precisely the principle we are promoting.”

    The negative publicity over the flotilla raid has already forced Israel to ease its Gaza blockade, removing most limits on consumer goods while maintaining restrictions on building materials, banning most travel and exports and enforcing its tight naval blockade.

    Israel insists the blockade is needed to keep weapons out of the hands of Gaza’s radical Islamic Hamas rulers. Gaza militants have fired thousands of rockets at Israel, and Israel warns that allowing free flow of weapons into the coastal territory by sea would endanger countries beyond Israel as well.

    The U.N. is on record as opposing the naval blockade, and it was unclear how Israel could expect a favorable ruling with that in mind.

    Regev would not commit Israel in advance to accepting the findings of the commission, saying: “We’re entering this process in confidence that we’re talking about a panel that will be credible and objective.”

    “We are sure that any independent look at the facts will verify that Israel took appropriate steps enforcing the naval blockade,” he told The Associated Press.

    Awfully cocky, those Israeli officials, sure that an independent look will validate their actions. What a strange definition of independent they must have. The blockade is illegal, collective punishment, psychological warfare with no resemblance to self-defense, so how can enforcing it with deadly force be appropriate? No, Israel is making a show of cooperating because the bad publicity has become too overwhelming to ignore, but when the inevitable judgment comes down rejecting their claims, it will scream that they were tricked, the panel was not really fair or objective, otherwise how could it have failed to see things their way? Israel is a master of spin, but there comes a point when the machinations of the most skillful spin masters become transparent. Israel can say it has nothing to hide, but that may be whistling in the dark, since it is becoming increasingly difficult to hide the truth, even from its allies.

  23. Aletha Says:
    September 24th, 2010 at 12:12 am

    The verdict of the UN panel investigating the Israeli attack on the Gaza aid flotilla is in, and Israel is not pleased. This story is from the Guardian

    UN panel accuses Israel of war crimes for ‘unlawful’ assault on Gaza flotilla
    Chris McGreal in New York
    The Guardian, Thursday 23 September 2010

    A United Nations panel of human rights experts has accused Israel of war crimes through willful killing, unnecessary brutality and torture in its “clearly unlawful” assault on a ship attempting to break the blockade of Gaza in May in which nine Turkish activists died.

    The report by three experts appointed by the UN’s Human Rights Council (UNHRC) described the seizure of MV Mavi Marmara, a Turkish vessel, by Israeli commandos as illegal under international law.

    It condemned the treatment of the passengers and crew as brutal and disproportionate. It also said that the Israeli blockade of the Palestinian enclave is illegal because of the scale of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

    “There is clear evidence to support prosecutions of the following crimes within the terms of article 147 of the fourth Geneva convention: wilful killing; torture or inhuman treatment; wilfully causing great suffering or serious injury to body or health,” the report said.

    “A series of violations of international law, including international humanitarian and human rights law, were committed by the Israeli forces during the interception of the flotilla and during the detention of passengers in Israel prior to deportation.”

    Israel swiftly dismissed the accusations as “politicised and extremist”. But the report is likely to be welcomed by Turkey which has dramatically cooled once-close relations with the Jewish state since the attack on the ship.

    The 56-page report – compiled by a former UN war crimes prosecutor, Desmond de Silva, a judge from Trinidad, Karl Hudson-Phillips, and a Malaysian women’s rights advocate, Mary Shanthi Dairiam – accuses Israeli forces of various crimes including violating the right to life, liberty and freedom of expression, and of failing to treat the captured crew and passengers with humanity.

    “The conduct of the Israeli military and other personnel toward the flotilla passengers was not only disproportionate to the occasion but demonstrated levels of totally unnecessary and incredible violence. It betrayed an unacceptable level of brutality,” the report said.

    The UN security council is expected to debate the findings on Monday.

    The report does not have any legal force and the UN human rights council, which has been accused of a disproportionate focus on Israel, is viewed with scepticism by many western countries because it is dominated by the developing world.

    But the report will be a further severe embarrassment to Israel after the assault on the ships brought widespread international condemnation even by generally sympathetic countries and breached relations with Turkey.

    Israel, which refused to co-operate with the inquiry, said the report is biased.

    “The Human Rights Council blamed Israel prior to the investigation and it is no surprise that they condemn after,” said Andy David, a spokesman for the Israeli foreign ministry.

    Israel has claimed that its troops only resorted to force and opened fire after coming under attack by activists with metal bars, axes and wooden clubs. The pro-Palestinian activists said they were defending the ship from what amounted to a pirate attack on a vessel in international waters.

    “Israel is a democratic and law-abiding country that carefully observes international law and, when need be, knows how to investigate itself,” the foreign ministry said in a statement. “That is how Israel has always acted, and that is the way in which investigations were conducted following Operation Cast Lead, launched to protect the inhabitants of southern Israel from rockets and terror attacks carried out by Hamas from Gaza.”

    Fawzi Barhoum, a spokesman for Hamas, said that the report is further evidence that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories violates human rights “not only against Palestinian people but against innocent people who came to show their sympathy”.

    He said the report should be used as the basis for international prosecutions of Israeli commanders responsible for the attack.

    Israel carefully observes international law? As it interprets it, perhaps, otherwise this is a blatant attempt to spin away this verdict. That would be nothing new; Israel always proclaims its actions are justified as necessary self-defense, therefore it acted in accordance with international law. Others may have different opinions on what constitutes self-defense. War crimes cannot be required for self-defense, but neither Israel nor its enabler USA has any problem committing war crimes in the name of self-defense. War crimes can only be committed by the other side, so whatever Israel or USA thinks is necessary to wage their wars against “terrorism” must be justified. The United Nations was founded to prevent such aggression by rogue states, but its hands are tied; it can denounce Israel all it wants, but nothing will come of it, because USA will use its veto power to prevent the Security Council from taking any action to punish Israel. In other words, USA, far from being an honest broker seeking to mediate a peace, has been complicit in Israeli war crimes.

  24. Aletha Says:
    April 5th, 2011 at 10:54 pm

    New information has caused Judge Goldstone to retract his accusation that civilians were targeted as a matter of policy, though two of the three others who worked with him on the report do not agree,and UN has declared the report still stands.
    This story is from the Guardian

    Judge Goldstone expresses regrets about his report into Gaza war
    The judge who chaired the controversial UN inquiry into Israel’s attack on Gaza from December 2008 has expressed regret that his report may have been inaccurate.

    Richard Goldstone, who led the committee that produced the Goldstone report, said in a newspaper article that “if I had known then what I know now, the Goldstone report would have been a very different document”.

    The judge’s article was welcomed by Israeli leaders. Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, told ministers on Sunday: “There are very few incidents in which false accusations are taken back, and this is the case with the Goldstone report.”

    He said that Israel would now try to get the report retracted by the UN.

    The Gaza War, which the Israeli army called Operation Cast Lead, began in December 2008 and lasted for three weeks.

    By the end, more than 1,400 Palestinians were dead, at least half of whom were civilians, and 13 Israelis, three of whom were civilians.

    However, in a new article in the Washington Post, Goldstone appeared to backtrack from some of his findings.

    He wrote that subsequent Israeli military investigations had confirmed some of the report’s findings but also indicated that, “civilians were not intentionally targeted as a matter of policy” by Israel.

    He cited the killing of 29 members of the al-Simouni family as evidence that Israel had not deliberately targeted civilians.

    “The shelling of the home was apparently the consequence of an Israeli commander’s erroneous interpretation of a drone image, and an Israeli officer is under investigation for having ordered the attack.”

    Goldstone said that his committee made recommendations based on the evidence before them, but because Israel refused to submit evidence, its views could not be taken into account.

    “As I indicated right from the beginning, I would have welcomed Israel’s co-operation,” he said.

    He also noted that the Israeli army had begun 400 investigations into allegations against Israeli soldiers but regretted that more than two years later, few had been finished and none had been held in public.

    Captain Aryeh Shalikar, a spokesman for the Israeli army, said that Goldstone’s article proved that Israeli forces had never intentionally targeted Gazan civilians, while the strategy of Hamas was to target Israeli civilians.

    “We have also demonstrated that we are ready and willing to investigate ourselves,” he said.

    Israeli officials admit that the Gaza war, because of the high Palestinian death toll and subsequent furore, has caused the country diplomatic and public relations problems.

    Speculation is rife that Goldstone has succumbed to political pressures. That Goldstone now appears ready to visit Israel and work to nullify the entire report, as Israel’s interior minister claimed on Tuesday, raises such suspicions, especially considering the peculiar timing. As Jonathan Cook reports for CounterPunch,

    Late last month the UN’s Human Rights Council, which set up the fact-finding mission, recommended that the General Assembly refer the Goldstone Report to the Security Council – the decisive stage in moving it to the International Criminal Court.

    Judge Goldstone is Jewish. He may have been vulnerable to pressures in light of this impending escalation of the matter. Regardless, this rethinking by Goldstone has proved nothing, despite Israeli claims of being vindicated. In the case of one incident among countless war crimes, Goldstone has been convinced Israel made a mistake instead of deliberately targeting civilians in Gaza. The Israeli military investigations of itself deserve no credibility.

    Mr. Cook reports,

    However, according to both Israeli human rights groups and a committee of independent legal experts appointed by the UN to monitor implementation of the report, Goldstone’s applause for Israel’s investigations is unwarranted.

    Sarit Michaeli, a spokeswoman for B’Tselem, an Israeli organisation monitoring human rights in the occupied territories, said Israel had failed to conduct a prompt, independent or transparent inquiry.

    “The materials on which Israel has relied have not been made available to us, so we are not in a position to judge the quality of the investigations or the credibility of the findings.”

    Likewise, the UN committee of experts, led by a New York judge, Mary McGowan-Davis, has complained that the Israeli army is probing itself and questioned the effectiveness of the investigations following “unnecessary delays” in which evidence may have been “lost or compromised”.

    Human rights groups have pointed out that, despite the large number of deaths in Gaza, only three of the 400 investigations cited by Goldstone have so far led to indictments.

    None of this seems to vindicate Israel. There are too many unanswered questions, and the Guardian reports (in the above linked story about the invitation to visit Israel) Goldstone has turned down an interview request from the Associated Press. Does he have something to hide? Has his loyalty to his fellow Jews trumped his loyalty to the truth? It appears obvious, something got to him, and I doubt it was new evidence as he claims. Israel may have had an excuse for that one incident that Goldstone says made him rethink his accusation of deliberate targeting of civilians, but that entire conflict was carried out with precious little regard for how many civilians would be killed, and whether the death of civilians was intentional is not the crucial issue distinguishing a war crime from an unavoidable mistake. Israel knew many civilians would be killed. Despite its claims of taking great pains to avoid that, it carried out many attacks that were bound to kill civilians. Not to mention, Israel had no right to invade Gaza in the first place. That was an act of military aggression, expressly forbidden by the UN charter.

  25. Aletha Says:
    April 7th, 2011 at 12:08 am

    The new head of the Democratic National Committee is a staunch ally of Israel. This assertion of the Israeli right to self-defense after its brazen attack on a Turkish ship attempting to bring supplies to Gaza is from her Congressional website

    Rep. Wasserman Schultz Statement on Israel’s Right to Self Defense
    June 2, 2010

    The loss of life that occurred off Israel’s coast early Monday morning was tragic and regrettable. At this difficult time, it is vital that the international community not inflame the situation with condemnations and unjust criticism of Israel.

    We must stand strong with Israel amidst the tragedy.

    We must remember several elements of this conflict that place this tragedy in context. All but one of the flotilla’s ships were able to safely and peacefully transfer humanitarian goods to Gaza, via the Israeli port city of Ashdod. In this case, the aim of the passengers aboard the Mavi Marmara was not merely humanitarian aid, but to incite political confrontation and challenge Israel’s legitimate maritime blockade. The delivery of aid to Gaza by this flotilla convoy was a pretense to rouse political provocation against Israel.

    We must not forget that this blockade exists because Hamas, the ruling party of Gaza, is a terrorist organization with the sworn goal to destroy the Jewish State. Such a blockade by Israel and Egypt is a means to stop the smuggling of illegal materials and weapons to Hamas. Conversely, the Israeli Navy worked to plan a non-violent interception of the flotilla and only used force when soldiers’ lives were at risk.

    Tragically, members of the Israeli military were beaten and stabbed while trying to peacefully escort this ship to shore, where all donated goods could have been transferred to the people of Gaza.

    As Israel continues to face unjust criticism on the world stage, the United States must continue to support our friend, ally, and partner. In the meantime, this incident should in no way take our focus off the impending threat of a nuclear Iran, which is the greatest threat to global security and peace in the Middle East.

    Unjust criticism? Iran “is the greatest threat to global security and peace in the Middle East?” The President may feel a need to shore up support from Jews and women as he campaigns for reelection, but making this Jewish Congresswoman who consistently blindly parrots such blatant Israeli propaganda head of the DNC does not bode well for prospects of peace in the Middle East. As usual, politics trumps principle, and protecting Israeli impunity for war crimes matters far more than the truth, or the rights of Palestinians.

  26. Aletha Says:
    September 7th, 2011 at 1:04 am

    Israel is digging in its heels, after a UN report said its blockade of Gaza was legal, but that it had used excessive force during the raid on the Gaza aid flotilla that killed nine Turkish citizens. This story is from AFP

    Israel will not apologise to Turkey says minister
    (AFP) – 2 hours ago

    JERUSALEM — Israel will not apologise to Turkey for a deadly May 2010 raid on a Gaza-bound flotilla and will not lift its blockade on the Gaza Strip, an Israeli minister insisted on Wednesday, as ties with Ankara sank to new lows.

    “Israel defends its interests and its government will not apologise,” said Israel Katz, Israel’s transport minister and a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party.

    Relations had already frayed over the incident but tensions reached new highs last week after the UN published a report on the raid, accusing Israel of using excessive force during the operation, but endorsing the Jewish state’s naval blockade on Gaza.

    Turkey responded angrily to the report, announcing the expulsion of Israel’s ambassador and suspending military agreements with the Jewish state.

    The report’s publication had been delayed several times while the two countries tried to patch up relations. Ankara had called on Israel to offer an apology for the raid, compensation and to lift the blockade on Gaza, terms all rejected by the Israeli government.

    On Wednesday, Katz reiterated that the Gaza blockade would not be lifted.

    “Israel maintains its naval blockade of Gaza to stop the transfer of weapons to terrorists from Hamas,” he said, referring to the Islamist movement that rules the coastal territory.

    Israel has accepted the UN report, with some reservations, but Turkey dismissed its findings and has threatened to lodge a legal case against the Jewish state before the International Criminal Court.

    I wonder if the difference between defending its interests and self-defense registers on the Israeli government. Of course it is defending its interests by blockading Gaza; but Israel has claimed the blockade is necessary for its self-defense, which is just propaganda noise, treating shipments of food and construction materials as if they were weapons. Somehow USA must have twisted enough arms to get UN to endorse the blockade. USA knows all about claiming defending its interests is self-defense. If it could not pull off that trick of propaganda, there would be no way to justify the invasions of Afghanistan or Iraq, let alone the drone strikes on Pakistan and Yemen.

    I hope Turkey does take this to the International Criminal Court. That court may also be subject to US pressure, but since USA has refused to recognize its jurisdiction, it may be more independent than UN.

  27. Aletha Says:
    November 15th, 2012 at 9:35 pm

    What will stop the Israeli assault on Gaza this time? Israel called off Operation Cast Lead just before Obama was inaugurated, and some have speculated that was a deliberate tactic to avoid putting Obama on the spot, since he was not yet President and thus was in no position to do anything to influence the outcome. Now Obama is in such a position, but he is taking his usual stance, that Israel has the right to self-defense. UN Security Council has met, but is paralyzed as usual, since USA is bound to veto any condemnation of Israel. This story is from Reuters

    UPDATE 6-UN holds emergency session on Israel strikes, takes no action
    Wed Nov 14, 2012 11:20pm EST

    By Louis Charbonneau

    UNITED NATIONS, Nov 14 (Reuters) – The U.N. Security Council held an emergency meeting on Wednesday night to discuss Israeli strikes against the Gaza Strip b u t took no action, as Israel threatened a wider offensive in the Palestinian enclave to stem rocket salvoes by Hamas militants.

    Indian Ambassador Hardeep Singh Puri, president of the 15-nation Security Council this month, told reporters after the 90-minute closed-door meeting that council members had only agreed to issue a communique stating that an emergency meeting took place and other procedural details.

    Speaking on behalf of India, not the Security Council, Puri expressed the hope that the fact the council meeting took place would help to ease tensions in the Middle East and prevent an escalation of the conflict.

    “The message that must be taken from this meeting is the violence must stop,” he said, adding that the council was prepared to meet again on Gaza if necessary.

    The Palestinians Authority had asked the council to issue a statement urging Israel to halt its offensive, but no such declaration was agreed.

    Israel launched a new major offensive against Palestinian Hamas militants in Gaza on Wednesday, killing Hamas’ military commander in an air strike and threatening an invasion of the enclave that the Islamist group said would “open the gates of hell.”

    U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s press office said earlier in two separate statements that he spoke on the telephone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Mohamed Mursi of Egypt.

    “(Ban) expressed his concern (to Netanyahu) about the deteriorating situation in southern Israel and the Gaza Strip, which includes an alarming escalation of indiscriminate rocket fire from Gaza into Israel and the targeted killing by Israel of a Hamas military operative in Gaza,” the United Nations said.

    Ban also voiced his expectation that “Israeli reactions are measured so as not to provoke a new cycle of bloodshed.”

    He also discussed with Mursi “the need to prevent any further deterioration,” the United Nations said.

    U.S. President Barack Obama also spoke with Netanyahu and Mursi and reiterated U.S. support for Israel’s right to self-defense in light of rocket attacks from Gaza, the White House said.

    “The president urged Prime Minister Netanyahu to make every effort to avoid civilian casualties. The two agreed that Hamas needs to stop its attacks on Israel to allow the situation to de-escalate,” the White House statement said.

    ‘MALICIOUS ONSLAUGHT’

    The emergency Security Council meeting came at the request of Egypt, Morocco and the Palestinians.

    “Once again the international community is witness to Israel’s malicious onslaught,” the Palestinian Authority’s U.N. envoy, Riyad Mansour, told the Security Council.

    “The Israeli occupying forces are now mobilizing on the ground as we speak,” Mansour said. “Fear and panic are spreading among the Palestinian civilian population.”

    The militant group Hamas, not the Palestinian Authority, controls Gaza.

    U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice told the council there was “no justification for the violence that Hamas and other terrorist organizations are employing against the people of Israel,” according to the written text of her statement. “We call on those responsible to stop these cowardly acts immediately.”

    Mansour said the Israeli action was intended to draw attention away from the Palestinians’ plan to seek an upgrade of its observer status at the United Nations from that of an “entity” to a “non-member state,” implicitly recognizing Palestinian statehood.

    Israel and the United States have made clear they would oppose the Palestinian upgrade, which would give it the right to join international bodies like the International Criminal Court, where it could file legal complaints against Israel.

    U.N. diplomats said a vote on the Palestinian request was tentatively scheduled for Nov. 29. A senior Western diplomat said the Palestinians would easily secure 120 to 130 votes out of the 193-nation General Assembly, which would ensure the success of their upgraded status at the United Nations.

    Prosor told the council that the Palestinian push for a status upgrade was “march of folly.”

    “The Palestinian leadership is marching down a road that can only lead to more conflict, instability and violence,” he said.

    How Israel loves to blame the victim of its violence! What is the justification for this violence, which as usual is totally out of proportion to the damage wrought by the rocket attacks? Cowardice is a charge best leveled at bullies. Is Hamas bullying and terrorizing Israel, or the other way around? Why does Israel feel threatened by this “march of folly?” Is it because the International Criminal Court, compromised as it is, may still come to the inescapable conclusion of any remotely fair-minded court that Israel is guilty of war crimes too numerous to count?

    Hamas needs to stop its attacks on Israel to allow the situation to de-escalate? Why is that? Why is Israel not obligated to stop its attacks on Gaza to allow the situation to de-escalate? Because Israel thinks its violence is justified, that the rocket attacks cannot be tolerated. If Israel had any interest in making peace, as opposed to killing those it deems terrorists with whom it absolutely refuses to negotiate, despite the fact Hamas won a fair election in Gaza and is therefore the legitimate representative of the Gazan people, perhaps the rocket attacks would stop! Israel says it wants peace, but the terms it has set it knows full well are totally unacceptable to the Palestinians. That is by design. Israel wants to keep the land it has taken and settled. Israel will not allow the Palestinians it drove into exile to return, because that would make the Jews a minority in Israel, and it would no longer be a Jewish state. Many nations have been controlled by a minority group, but those nations did not claim to be democracies, or if they did, the majority was disempowered, not having the right to vote, if any rights at all, such as in apartheid South Africa. It is no coincidence that Israel was a staunch ally of South Africa in those days.

    USA is not the only nation guilty of justifying war crimes by virtue of its doctrine of exceptionalism. Israel likewise feels no need to comply with international law, since it has the virtually unqualified backing of USA and thinks most other nations are prejudiced against Israel, or do not grasp the reality of the situation Israel faces. Israel and USA are both young nations; they see no problem with their doctrine of exceptionalism, but most people in the world understand that as compromised as international law is, if every nation excepted itself and made its own rules, they could all justify killing anyone who does not like them. As Hamas put it, the gates of hell would be opened. The Bush doctrine was another turn of phrase, you are either with us or against us, either an ally or fair game for attack. This may seem to make sense in a black and white death-worshiping culture, but that is no way to end the cycle of violence. Of course, that is the point; neither USA nor Israel wants to end their cycles of violence. The war on terror must go on, until all the terrorists are dead, or at least beaten into submission!

Leave a Reply

(Visited 13323 times)