Goldstone - yes, Goldstone - defends Israel from "apartheid" slander [UPDATED]

(Israel Matzav: The education of R*I*C*H*A*R*D* G*O*L*D*S*T*O*N*E)

This passage made me wonder whether he gets it yet.

The situation in the West Bank is more complex. But here too there is no intent to maintain “an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group.” This is a critical distinction, even if Israel acts oppressively toward Palestinians there. South Africa’s enforced racial separation was intended to permanently benefit the white minority, to the detriment of other races. By contrast, Israel has agreed in concept to the existence of a Palestinian state in Gaza and almost all of the West Bank, and is calling for the Palestinians to negotiate the parameters.

So let me get this straight: Israel's rule in the West Bank Judea and Samaria is not “an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group” only because we have "agreed in concept to the existence of a 'Palestinian state' in Gaza and almost all of the West Bank?" And every country that does not agree to cut off part of its land is promoting apartheid? And every ethnic group that decides it's entitled to a 'state' is a victim of
apartheid if it doesn't get that state? And were we one day to decide that we have had enough of the 'Palestinians' being unwilling to negotiate with us (and we all know why they are unwilling to negotiate with us), and we withdraw whatever offers of 'statehood' have been made, would we then be practicing apartheid?
Goldstone still has a lot to learn.

From the New York Times, an op-ed by Richard Goldstone, author of the infamous Goldstone Report that slandered Israel:

THE Palestinian Authority’s request for full United Nations membership has put hope for any two-state solution under increasing pressure. The need for reconciliation between Israelis and Palestinians has never been greater. So it is important to separate legitimate criticism of Israel from assaults that aim to isolate, demonize and delegitimize it.
One particularly pernicious and enduring canard that is surfacing again is that Israel pursues “apartheid” policies. In Cape Town starting on Saturday, a London-based nongovernmental organization called the Russell Tribunal on Palestine will hold a “hearing” on whether Israel is guilty of the crime of apartheid. It is not a “tribunal.” The “evidence” is going to be one-sided and the members of the “jury” are critics whose harsh views of Israel are well known.
While “apartheid” can have broader meaning, its use is meant to evoke the situation in pre-1994 South Africa. It is an unfair and inaccurate slander against Israel, calculated to retard rather than advance peace negotiations.
I know all too well the cruelty of South Africa’s abhorrent apartheid system, under which human beings characterized as black had no rights to vote, hold political office, use “white” toilets or beaches, marry whites, live in whites-only areas or even be there without a “pass.” Blacks critically injured in car accidents were left to bleed to death if there was no “black” ambulance to rush them to a “black” hospital. “White” hospitals were prohibited from saving their lives.
In assessing the accusation that Israel pursues apartheid policies, which are by definition primarily about race or ethnicity, it is important first to distinguish between the situations in Israel, where Arabs are citizens, and in West Bank areas that remain under Israeli control in the absence of a peace agreement.
In Israel, there is no apartheid. Nothing there comes close to the definition of apartheid under the 1998 Rome Statute: “Inhumane acts ... committed in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial group or groups and committed with the intention of maintaining that regime.” Israeli Arabs — 20 percent of Israel’s population — vote, have political parties and representatives in the Knesset and occupy positions of acclaim, including on its Supreme Court. Arab patients lie alongside Jewish patients in Israeli hospitals, receiving identical treatment.
To be sure, there is more de facto separation between Jewish and Arab populations than Israelis should accept. Much of it is chosen by the communities themselves. Some results from discrimination. But it is not apartheid, which consciously enshrines separation as an ideal. In Israel, equal rights are the law, the aspiration and the ideal; inequities are often successfully challenged in court.
The situation in the West Bank is more complex. But here too there is no intent to maintain “an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group.” This is a critical distinction, even if Israel acts oppressively toward Palestinians there. South Africa’s enforced racial separation was intended to permanently benefit the white minority, to the detriment of other races. By contrast, Israel has agreed in concept to the existence of a Palestinian state in Gaza and almost all of the West Bank, and is calling for the Palestinians to negotiate the parameters.
But until there is a two-state peace, or at least as long as Israel’s citizens remain under threat of attacks from the West Bank and Gaza, Israel will see roadblocks and similar measures as necessary for self-defense, even as Palestinians feel oppressed. As things stand, attacks from one side are met by counterattacks from the other. And the deep disputes, claims and counterclaims are only hardened when the offensive analogy of “apartheid” is invoked.
Those seeking to promote the myth of Israeli apartheid often point to clashes between heavily armed Israeli soldiers and stone-throwing Palestinians in the West Bank, or the building of what they call an “apartheid wall” and disparate treatment on West Bank roads. While such images may appear to invite a superficial comparison, it is disingenuous to use them to distort the reality. The security barrier was built to stop unrelenting terrorist attacks; while it has inflicted great hardship in places, the Israeli Supreme Court has ordered the state in many cases to reroute it to minimize unreasonable hardship. Road restrictions get more intrusive after violent attacks and are ameliorated when the threat is reduced.
Of course, the Palestinian people have national aspirations and human rights that all must respect. But those who conflate the situations in Israel and the West Bank and liken both to the old South Africa do a disservice to all who hope for justice and peace.
Jewish-Arab relations in Israel and the West Bank cannot be simplified to a narrative of Jewish discrimination. There is hostility and suspicion on both sides. Israel, unique among democracies, has been in a state of war with many of its neighbors who refuse to accept its existence. Even some Israeli Arabs, because they are citizens of Israel, have at times come under suspicion from other Arabs as a result of that longstanding enmity.
The mutual recognition and protection of the human dignity of all people is indispensable to bringing an end to hatred and anger. The charge that Israel is an apartheid state is a false and malicious one that precludes, rather than promotes, peace and harmony.

As night follows day, we can expect the rabid anti-Israel Left who embraced Goldstone as their messiah two years ago will issue vicious condemnations of this piece, and charge Goldstone with being a tool of the Zionist lobby, tomorrow.
But as bad as the Goldstone Report was - and its flaws were so numerous as to border on the malicious - it was not in the same league as the anti-Zionist Left who routinely accuse Israel of "apartheid." These people are not interested in facts or in arguments. They are inherently dishonest and their interest in the truth is nil. They have one purpose and one purpose only - to destroy Israel. It is mindless hate.
And it is a shame that their lies have gained such currency that someone like Goldstone even feels compelled to answer them.
If I had to do some armchair psychology, my guess is that he saw people used his report in ways he never intended, mostly people who didn't even bother to read it themselves. Very possibly, he did not want to be associated with such haters who pretended he was one of them, sort of like Benny Morris after his early works on Israel's history.

via elderofziyon.blogspot.com

Wikileaks: Australia, Goldstone, Mossad, Hamas and Dubai

Israel’s suspicions that Australia reversed its pro-Israel vote on the Goldstone Commission report in 2010 because of Canberra’s anger over the use of forged Australian passports in the assassination of a Hamas operative in Dubai received confirmation via a US cable out of the Canberra embassy published by WikiLeaks on Monday. The Jerusalem Post and h/t Challah. Here is the full cable.

#GoldStoneReport flashback! Bayefsky - Meet the UN's anti-Israel 'anti-discrimination' czar, Navi Pillay

The UN's top human rights official, Navi Pillay, attempted on Monday to block further defections from the UN's racist "anti-racism" bash scheduled for New York City on Sept. 22. The United States, Canada, Israel, the Czech Republic, Italy and the Netherlands have already announced a boycott of "Durban III," a UN event designed to "commemorate" the 10th anniversary of the UN anti-Semitic hatefest held in Durban, South Africa, in September 2001. Pillay said she was "disappointed" with these pullouts, labeling them a "political distraction."

The barb was no accident for a UN high commissioner for human rights who has been distracted by her anti-Israel and anti-American agenda since taking office in 2008. Pillay is perhaps best known for her unremitting defense of the notorious Goldstone report and for having questioned the legality of the killing of Osama Bin Laden.

For Pillay, championing the Durban conference and its manifesto, the Durban Declaration, is a personal crusade. A native of Durban herself, shortly after her appointment she explained to a Geneva audience that the city's mayor asked her to "rescue the name of Durban," given its unflattering association with anti-Semitism. In response, she helped launch both Durban II in Geneva in 2009 and Durban III.

Unfortunately, her efforts to legitimize the Durban Declaration have little to do with the most basic of human rights: equality. The Durban Declaration charges only one country with racism among all 192 UN states - Israel. It calls Palestinians "victims" of Israeli racism, a 21st century reincarnation of the Zionism-is-racism libel. When Durban II ended with an "outcome document" that reaffirmed the Durban Declaration, Pillay gloated in a news conference on April 24, 2009, that Palestine is indeed "mentioned in the Durban Declaration and the word 'reaffirm' carries those paragraphs into this document."

While Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad addressed the "anti-racism" crowd at Durban II, Pillay remained glued to her seat. UN videotape shows her simply watching democratic states walk out in disgust, although she and her secretariat colleagues had a copy of his Holocaust-denying speech in advance. Despite her later scramble, when under pressure, to distance herself from his comments, she issued a flowery thank-you to the Organization of the Islamic Conference for their role in Durban II - which included warm applause for Ahmadinejad.

Pillay's enthusiasm for the Durban "anti-racism" agenda goes hand in hand with her single-minded pursuit of the demonization of Israel throughout her tenure. In January 2009, Pillay called for the creation of what became the Goldstone inquiry. In August 2009, she issued a report that lauded Hamas for having "made public statements that it is committed to respect international human rights and humanitarian law." After Goldstone claimed that Israel had intentionally targeted civilians, Pillay said on Sept. 30, 2009, "I lend my full support to Justice Goldstone's report and its recommendations." Goldstone has since recanted the veracity of his slur; Pillay has not.

In July 2010, she made a rare appearance before the Security Council on "situations where the protection of civilians has been and remains of great concern" around the world - and made only two pleas to the council, both about Israel. Referring to Gaza, she said: "I urge the council . . . to ensure the lifting in full of the blockade" - which would stymie Israel's ability to limit the flow of arms to Hamas. And she made this plea: "I urge the Security Council to support the recommendations of the UN Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict" - that is, the Goldstone report.

After a visit this past February to Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, she said this at her final Jerusalem news conference: "The clearest manifestation of institutional discrimination is the fact that during all my meetings with government and state officials, I do not believe I met a single Palestinian citizen of Israel." She could have easily determined that Israeli Arabs are members of Israel's parliament, in the diplomatic corps and on the Supreme Court. The discrimination that was apparently unclear to Pillay was the institutional charter of the Hamas government in Gaza, which calls for the annihilation of the Jewish citizens of Israel, and the Palestinian Authority's refusal to recognize the right of a Jewish state to exist at all.

The antagonism between Pillay's political priorities and the interests of Americans was most evident in her reaction to the death of Bin Laden. On May 3, Pillay expressed concern about his treatment. She demanded to know "the precise facts surrounding his killing" for the purpose of determining its legality. According to Pillay, "counterterrorism activity . . . in compliance with international law" means "you're not allowed . . . to commit extrajudicial killings." And this requirement would be satisfied only if the Americans had stuck by what she claimed was their "stated . . . intention . . . to arrest Bin Laden if they could."

Her concern for Bin Laden was remarkable both for its flagrant contradiction with the laws of war justifying lethal force in his case, and for being three times as fast as her expressions of concern in March about the victims of lethal terror in Syria.

It is little wonder, therefore, that Pillay should be a fan of Durban III. On Monday, she confirmed that she will be coming to New York to participate in Durban III, which she described as an "important event . . . to combat discrimination." Discrimination defined by the sponsors of discrimination itself.

Anne Bayefsky
For more United Nations coverage see www.EYEontheUN.org.

info@eyeontheun.org
August 10, 2011 For Immediate Release:
This article by Anne Bayefsky appears on NY Daily News
via calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com

Ron Paul Counters Obama Policy on Israel, Middle East

A sneaky move by Paul to deflect the recent criticism that he never took back his accusations based on the Goldstone Report which proved fraudulent by Richard Goldstone himself. Paul's presidential hopes depend on quieting the Zionists in his own party... this is a way to attack Obama and build his own Pro Israel credentials... while at the same time push the idea of equivalence for all Foreign Aid. The denied correlative is that America has countries it trusts more then others and that is sound policy. Absolutes like Obama's giving to terrorists... and Paul's absolute of no help for friends have no reality to the struggles our country has had historically

Congressman Ron Paul issued a blistering critique of President Obama's recent proposal for Israel to surrender its territory to pre-1967 borders and create a Palestinian state.
“Unlike this President, I do not believe it is our place to dictate how Israel runs her affairs," the Texas Republican wrote in a May 20 press statement. "There can only be peace in the region if those sides work out their differences among one another. We should respect Israel’s sovereignty and not try to dictate her policy from Washington." Representative Paul has announced an electoral challenge to Obama as a Republican, and will face Obama in November 2012 if he can win the GOP nomination.
Obama had proposed May 19 that "We believe the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states." The proposal rocked the relationship between the United States and Israel, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rebuffed Obama in person the next day from an Oval Office press conference, complaining that "while Israel is prepared to make generous compromises for peace, it cannot go back to the 1967 lines — because these lines are indefensible; because they don’t take into account certain changes that have taken place on the ground, demographic changes that have taken place over the last 44 years."
Obama also promised some $2 billion in additional direct foreign aid to Egypt in the May 19 address. Egypt was until the 1980s an enemy of the Jewish state. Obama pledged an additional $2 billion investment from the U.S. government's Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) to North Africa and the Middle East.
By way of contrast, Rep. Paul has proposed eliminating all foreign aid. “I am not the only one who can see the absurdities of our foreign policy. We give $3 billion to Israel and $12 billion to her enemies," Paul wrote. "Most Americans know that makes no sense.... We are facing $2 trillion dollar deficits, and the American taxpayer cannot afford any of it."
Representative Paul also noted that U.S. foreign aid has often worked at cross-purposes with freedom in the Islamic world. Paul pointed out that for 30 years U.S. aid propped up the corrupt Mubarak regime in Egypt, a regime overthrown by the peaceful "Jasmine revolution" this spring. “As the President prepares to send even more support to Egypt, we should be reminded that it was our foreign aid that helped Mubarak retain power to repress his people in the first place. Now we have to deal with the consequences of those decisions, yet we keep repeating the same mistakes."
Obama's May 19 speech also took special note of the Jasmine revolution sweeping the Islamic world, a revolution that began in December in Tunisia and has since touched just about every Islamic nation. Obama claimed that "the people of the Middle East and North Africa had taken their future into their own hands." Obama even acknowledged that the United States and its policies had nothing to do with the peaceful demonstrations: "It’s not America that put people into the streets of Tunis or Cairo -– it was the people themselves who launched these movements, and it’s the people themselves that must ultimately determine their outcome."
But despite traditional U.S. foreign aid support for dictatorships, Obama implicitly threatened further intervention in Islamic nations and devoted particularly harsh criticism to Syria. "Most recently, the Syrian regime has chosen the path of murder and the mass arrests of its citizens.  The United States has condemned these actions, and working with the international community we have stepped up our sanctions on the Syrian regime –- including sanctions announced yesterday on President Assad and those around him." Syria has indeed launched a month-long bloody campaign against peaceful protesters, a campaign that appears to be getting bloodier.
Obama stressed that the United States stood for "universal human rights" and that "Our support for these principles is not a secondary interest. Today I want to make it clear that it is a top priority that must be translated into concrete actions, and supported by all of the diplomatic, economic and strategic tools at our disposal." To many observers, "strategic tools" is a code word for U.S. military action.
Representative Paul, by way of contrast, has opposed Obama's Libyan war and strongly condemned the implicit threat to attack Syria. “The President also defended his unconstitutional intervention in Libya, authorized not by the United States Congress but by the United Nations, and announced new plans to pressure Syria and force the leader of that country to step down," Paul wrote. “Our military is already dangerously extended, and this administration wants to expand our involvement. When will our bombing in Libya end? Is President Obama seriously considering military action against Syria?...We need to come to our senses, trade with our friends in the Middle East (both Arab and Israeli), clean up our own economic mess so we set a good example, and allow them to work out their own conflicts." via thenewamerican.com

If Paul is serious about moving into the American political mainstream then he is going to have to do more then sneaky tricks.  He is going to have to apologize for endorsing the findings of the Goldstone Report. There is a major flaw in both Obama and Ron Paul's thinking.  If the objective is really to end the role of America's police man status, then why would a downsized power be interested in not having allies?  Only parental figures appear to be even handed with their children.  Both Ron Paul and Obama have endorsed a policy that acts like a police state... Ron Paul's version being an economically sustainable policeman, though he won't admit why he intends to position America as neutral.  A real non internationalist nation would never be afraid to commit to it's friends.

Got a Public Relations problem with HUMAN RIGHTS ISSUES? No problem... Syria Attacks Israel

typical Goldstone styled accusation of civilian casualties....

Syria Allows Hundreds Across Israeli Border
for Naqba Protest to OBSCURE issues...
...Masses gather at border (Photo: Avihu Shapir)

Syria's squawking because
Israel killed "protesters"
...now this is chutzpah...

Assad is desperate when he punches below the belt like this. This is another example of how low the Syrians hold on the value of human dignity. They insult their own people like this. Absolutely no pride or respect. All eyes on Israel to put egg on it's face at any cost. Reminds me of what Fidel Castro did to his people.  Like usual the Arabs use the "NAQBA" as a cover for their own abuses.

Expert says details surrounding Nakba Day infiltration of border still unknown, but Israel will have to explain its actions.

“Most of the details surrounding the shooting are not yet known. Important considerations are whether the protesters were armed or not, whether they were an organized association of a para-military nature, whether the soldiers who fired felt they were in immediate danger and shot out of self defense and a series of other possibilities that are too vague to judge,” said Richmond-Barak.

...Abu Mazen AKA ABBAS....says:
protesters "precious blood will not be wasted";

She added that while there were legal questions to be considered, the most urgent concern was a deterioration of the diplomatic relations between the countries. via jpost.com

so without any information in yet... the typical Goldstone accusation of civilian casualties, and a Democracy is made responsible for the actions of a third world dictatorship.

Hamas calls Nakba Day events
"a turning point in the Israeli-Arab conflict"via jpost.com

I.e., killed a handful among large numbers of people who were trying to stage a violent invasion of Israel. How many "protesters" has Syria killed in the last couple of months?--I think 850 was the last count. The annual Chutzpah Prize has been awarded. The rest of 2011 is not required; nothing can possibly beat this.

via pdavidhornik.typepad.com

This is not very surprising, in fact it was predicted days ago.
The Syrian government, with the encouragement of anti-Israel Palestinian groups, Hezbollah and the Iranians, has sent hundreds of supposed "Palestinian refugess" surging across the Israeli border in the Golan in an attempt to provoke a confrontation.  The infiltratrors attempted to capture an Israeli Druse village, and fighting ensued, with initial reports of at least several infiltrators killed and many wounded.  Israel has sealed the border.
Israel Matzav is following and updating, including this video:

The invasion coincides with other violent actions against Israel to commemorate "Nakba" day. This is the day on which Palestinian Arabs commemorate the fact that they chose not abide by the U.N. Resolution creating separate Jewish and Arab states, and instead launched a war to drive the Jews into the sea, which they lost resulting in hundreds of thousands of refugess. Of course, true to form, the Palestinians blame everyone but themselves.
The narrative of the Palestinians as victims endures in academiaHundreds of thousands of Jews fled Arab lands during and in the aftermath the Arabs' attempt to drive the Jews into the sea. That is the part of the narrative you almost never hear about. via legalinsurrection.blogspot.com and image via israelifrontline.com and at the U.N. 

IDF troops on Syria border (Photo: Avihu Shapira)

By Sunday afternoon, the infiltrators began to make their way back to Syria following negotiations between the IDF, police and Druze elders.

The forces tried not to intervene as the Syrian youngsters marched back to their country while calling out "we'll be back," encouraged by applause from the Druze villagers who looked on. By 5 pm Sunday, the IDF said that all infiltrators left Israeli territory.

'We come in peace' 

"I'm tired of living in Syria, we'd rather die than see more bloodshed," one of the Syrian infiltrators into Majdal Shams told Ynet earlier. He called on Israel to grant him asylum, adding: "We've crossed the border in order to stay with our families, away from all the killing in Syria. We ask the powers at be in Israel to help us stay and not send us back."


Other infiltrators told Ynet that "we come in peace," adding that they had decided to cross the border in the aims of living in the Golan Heights – "even if it means risking our lives." Still, others declared "we are here to liberate the Syrian Palestinian land. These people are Palestinian freeman, Allah willing, the Palestinian groups will not give up."


Some of those expressing a wish to remain on the Israeli side of the border, said the uprising against
Syrian President Assad is proving more and more dangerous and that many Palestinians now fear for their lives.

via ynetnews.com

Tariq Ramadan Proves Switzerland is NOT Neutral

NOR WERE the Swiss EVER Neutral! Not during the Holocaust... not NOW!

Tariq Tricks: Favorite Islamist Spin

Christiane Amanpour could not get
Tariq Ramadan to condemn stoning of women
for whatever reason

In response to a question about how "the weaker" such as "Palestinians, Muslims and blacks" should resist "oppression," Ramadan recounted how, as he put it, "when Israel was killing innocent people in Gaza," Switzerland chose to break its neutrality and take the side of the Palestinians; not to do so would have been to implicitly support the "oppressor." The implication was that if even neutral Switzerland decided to support the Palestinians, everyone should. He did not bring up Hamas's use of human shields or its deliberate choice to store weapons in hospitals and near U.N. buildings, nor did he mention Richard Goldstone's recent recantation on the entire official narrative of the Gaza War.

Tariq Ramadan Discovers His Inner Flower Child by Jonathan Gelbart - American Thinker - May 15, 2011 via campus-watch.org and image via medialabmanizales.com

JStreet Refused to Help Rescind Goldstone

their values are sickening....

To the Editor:

Within hours of the posting of the JTA item "Senate unanimously calls for Goldstone rescission," a J Street Facebook fan posted a strong condemnation of the decision. Last week, I had asked the J Street leadership to endorse rescission. They wrote back saying they would not because nothing really happened as a result of the report and anyway, it was also critical of Hamas.
They do not seem to realize the strong support Goldstone’s report gives to the delegitimization and BDS campaigns.
Robert Gutman
Durham, N.C.

via challahhuakbar.blogspot.com @ JTA

Anyone need to be convinced about JStreet's politics? They are not liberal. They are not open minded at all... they are orchestrating hatred.

Posted via email from noahdavidsimon's posterous

Arab Media (After Goldstone) is Same Old, Same Old. Accusations of targeting CIVILIANS.

they don't skip a beat or flinch...

GAZA CITY (Ma'an) -- Spokesman of the Gaza government Taher An-Nunu said Friday that he had sent an official letter of complaint to the UN "and other involved parties" following the death of five civilians in Gaza during the day.

Israeli air and artillery fire hit the coastal enclave ten times during the day. An Israeli military statement acknowledged the deaths, saying it "regrets that the Hamas terrorist organization chooses to operate from within its civilian population, using it as a 'human shield'."
An-Nunu said Israel was taking the opportunity while the world was "preoccupied with other events," in the near and far east, and said that by "carrying out a series of escalations of attacks." via maannews.net

The United Nations and the Goldstone Report: Where Does It Go From Here?

The Liberal Lynch Mob Comes for the Jews Again...

The namesake of the infamous U.N. Goldstone Report, Richard Goldstone, suddenly confessed this past weekend in an article published by The Washington Post, that he had made a mistake. In September 2009, he and his U.N.-sponsored team made the wild accusation that Israel set out to murder civilians in the Gaza war rather than protect its own citizens from an unremitting genocidal campaign prosecuted for years by Palestinian terrorists.

Despite Richard Goldstone’s thirteenth hour confession, his diabolical legacy demonizing the state of Israel lives on at the United Nations. The body that created the Goldstone inquiry in 2009, the Human Rights Council, and the various entities that the Council has directed to implement his blood libel, have no intention of backing down. The facts be damned.
As of today, the U.N. system expects the Goldstone Report to be implemented as is. Four different follow-up activities are still percolating. These requirements emanate from a Human Rights Council resolution on the report that was adopted just a few weeks ago on March 25. Goldstone published his confession only after the Council once again pushed forward the implementation of his report – timing he would have known well in advance.
First, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights is required to “submit a progress report on the implementation of the [Goldstone report]…to the Human Rights Council at its 18th session of September 2011.” High Commissioner Navi Pillay will no doubt do everything in her power to keep it alive, since she was a main figure in sponsoring the report in the first place.
Prior to the decision of the Council in January 2009 to create the Goldstone inquiry, she first declared Israel guilty of “egregious violations of human rights” and then demanded “credible, independent, and transparent investigations … to identify violations and establish responsibilities.” After the report was issued Pillay became Goldstone’s lead champion, repeating dozens of times the words she first wrote in the Huffington Post shortly after the report’s release: “I lend my full support to Justice Goldstone's report and its recommendations.”
Pillay even took the report to the U.N. Security Council. On July 7, 2010 Pillay was asked by the Council to address the issue of “situations where the protection of civilians has been and remains of great concern.” After noting the millions affected by atrocities around the world, the only plea she made in her statement to the Security Council on behalf of the peoples of this earth was: “I urge the Security Council to support the recommendations of the United Nations Fact-Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict,” a.k.a., the Goldstone report.
Pillay, a native of Durban, South Africa who is similarly a lead champion of the Durban Declaration despite its deep-seated anti-semitism, is inextricably connected to the Goldstone report and its perjury against the Jewish state.

Second, the Secretary-General is required “to present a comprehensive report on the progress made in the implementation of the recommendations of the [Goldstone Report]…by all concerned parties, including United Nations bodies… to the Council at its 18th session of September 2011.” This mandate means the U.N. secretariat is required to ask large numbers of U.N. bodies for a report on what they in turn have done to implement the Goldstone Report, thus further spreading the report’s tentacles across the U.N. system.
Third, the Human Rights Council has “decide[d] to follow up on the implementation of the [Goldstone Report] …at its 19th session of March 2012.” So the Goldstone Report will come back to the Council next year.
Fourth, the Human Rights Council has asked the General Assembly to become more involved in promoting the report; it “urges the Assembly to submit that [Goldstone] report to the Security Council for its consideration and appropriate action, including consideration of referral of the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory to the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court…”
Truth and falsehood have never been reliable attributes of the U.N. human rights system. And undoubtedly, the U.N. Human Rights Council – which has expended so much effort to create and keep this scurrilous and bogus report alive – will not skip a beat. The Obama administration has run out of excuses for remaining on the Council and forcing Americans to pay for it.   The Facts from www.EYEontheUN.org

via daledamos.blogspot.com

image via foxthepoet.blogspot.com
This article by Anne Bayefsky appears today on Fox News.
For Immediate Release:
April 5, 2011
Contact: Anne Bayefsky
anne@hudsonny.org
(917) 488-1558

US lawyers to file civil suit against Goldstone

MK Danny Danon initiates lawsuit which will be submitted to US District Court in NY: “The distorted picture of the State of Israel that Goldstone generated harmed, harms and will continue to harm Israel."
Jewish attorneys plan to file a class action civil suit in the United States against South African jurist Richard Goldstone next week.

The move comes in the aftermath of an opinion piece Goldstone published in the Washington Post last week, in which he stated that he had erroneously accused Israel of internationally targeting innocent civilians in Gaza in a report he submitted on the matter to the United Nations in 2009. via jpost.com

Judge Goldstone Will Work To Have Goldstone Report Nullified

The Jerusalem Post is reporting that Judge Richard Goldstone has accepted an invitation to visit southern Israel, where the rockets are fired by the Hamas terrorists from Gaza.
More than that, after his op-ed last Friday, Judge Goldstone is not finished with the Goldstone Report:

'Goldstone says he'll work to nullify report in UN'
[Interior Minister Eli] Yishai said that Goldstone made a promise to work towards retracting his UN report. Former ambassador to the UN Danny Gillerman, who also spoke with Goldstone, added that the judge would not act immediately to do so.

He wants to "wait for the dust to settle" in the aftermath of an op-ed he penned in the Washington Post last week, in which he wrote that Israel, contrary to his famed UN report, did not target civilians in Operation Cast Lead as a matter of policy, AP reported.
UNHRC spokesman Cedric Sapey told The Jerusalem Post on Monday that in order for the body to reconsider the report, that the judge would first need to write a formal letter to that effect.

Of course, Goldstone going to bat for Israel in having the Goldstone Report rescinded based on incorrect information is no guarantee that the report will in fact be nullified. Goldstone's original mandate was biased to begin with, concentrating only on Israel and ignoring any investigation into Hamas.
On that basis--and the fact that we are, after all, talking about UN Human Rights Council--Goldstone will face an uphill and possibly unwinnable battle.
And then of course there is the issue of Goldstone's own reputation. For the past 2 years praise was showered upon Goldstone to such a degree that when they referred to Goldstone as a 'Zionist', it was not being said pejoratively. And if you do a search for "Sir Richard Goldstone" on Google, you get over 7500 hits!.
A lot of  that will change now. It is possible that Goldstone's new critics will do--and say--everything possible in order to discredit him.
(Note: Of course, there is another approach: Swedish Media Ignores Goldstone Confession)
This cannot be a pleasant time for Judge Richard Goldstone, and the fact that he has said that he will pursue the issue of having the Goldstone Report nullified is to his credit.

via daledamos.blogspot.com

image Source: Al-Watan, Saudi Arabia, April 5, 2011 via thememriblog.org

Posted via email from noahdavidsimon's posterous

DeNial is a RIVER not too far from Gaza: Nasty Ken Roth Wroths, Goldstone tries to save face

How can we expect Palestinian enablers to respect anything ever said. What Goldstone said just yesterday is no longer a truth. The British Mandate is not a truth. History has no truth... Yesterday has no truth. Nothing is consistent in identity politics. The great sin of the Left is betrayal. You couldn't even point out the truth to these people without being shackled, arrested and extradited to Washington State because you thought life and death were within the context of discussion.

He has a letter in the NYTimes today, trying to damage-control the Goldstone recantation:

To the Editor:

The significance of Richard Goldstone’s Op-Ed article in The Washington Post is being overblown. As the judge who led an investigation into the Gaza conflict, he stands by most of his report.
Mr. Goldstone’s shift focuses on his allegation that Israel had an apparent policy to target civilians. He says that because of information now available, he no longer concludes that civilians were intentionally targeted as a matter of policy.
Human Rights Watch’s investigation in Gaza found some cases of apparently deliberate killing of civilians by Israeli soldiers, such as the killing of 11 civilians holding white flags, but no evidence that these resulted from a policy to target civilians.
However, Mr. Goldstone has not repudiated his panel’s findings that Israel committed numerous serious violations of the laws of war. Israeli forces, according to the Goldstone report, indiscriminately used heavy artillery and white phosphorous in densely populated areas and deliberately destroyed civilian buildings and infrastructure without a lawful military reason. That conduct was so widespread and systematic that it must have reflected policy.
As for investigations, Israel looks good only by comparison with Hamas, which has done nothing at all to investigate its war crimes. Israel has indicted four soldiers and convicted three. Only one has served jail time (7 1/2 months), for stealing a credit card.
Israel has yet to investigate the policies behind the indiscriminate attacks that caused so much civilian harm.
KENNETH ROTH
Executive Director
Human Rights Watch
New York, April 3, 2011

a) in writing "As the judge...", Roth seeks to imply this was an actual judicial inquiry rather than an investigative one.
b) in writing "apparently deliberate killing" he seeks to offset Goldstone who insists Israel had no intentional policy.  Israel never claimed there could have been such cases of local lack of discipline, and actually investigated claims of such.  He is comparing apples and pears.  He also adds "apparent" to cover his tuches.
c)  those 'findings' are disputed by Israel and the proof is not based in all cases on reliable sources.
Poor chap.
^

via myrightword.blogspot.com

Posted via email from noahdavidsimon's posterous

Human Rights Watch director Ken Roth, perhaps sensing that the cash cow of anti-Israel hatred may dry up as the result of Richard Goldstone’s recent retraction of allegations that Israel targeted civilians during the Gaza War, penned a feverish reply at CiF (Gaza: the stain remains on Israel’s war record, April 5.) to help sustain his group’s narrative of Israeli villainy.
Guardian readers, clearly relieved that their nearly week-long nightmare of doubt over Israeli sin following Goldstone’s mea culpa is over, took to the streets below the line en mass to express their emotion.
Let the hate begin:
Hamas is actually more moral than Israel. Their rocket attacks represents legitimate resistance.

Israel is a criminal and insane nation which kills and enslaves innocent Palestinians, and who bases their national legitimacy on an “ancient fairy tale”.

Israel guilty of murdering Palestinian children

Characterizing Hamas as anti-Semitic represents Israeli paranoia.  (Bonus: Comical semantic argument that Israeli Jews are the real anti-Semites)

Reader hopes Hamas won’t be negatively influenced by Zionist villainy and stoop to Israeli level of cruelty

Israel is marching towards Armaggedon

Israel is “slowly starving” Palestinians, and is guilty of the worst crimes against humanity in the world

Israelis are immutably and irredeemably racist

Hamas is not a terrorist group, just a “rag-tag” bunch of poorly equipped hooligans

Israel should apologize to their Arab neighbors for their murderous behavior over the last 50 years

Israel shoots anything that moves, including donkeys and “ancient grandmothers”

It seems that Goldstone’s retraction represented merely his collapse under “Zionist pressure”

via cifwatch.com

Goldstone's retraction an attempt to escape ostracism?

It's all fine an dandy that we find out what a weak man our prosecutor was, but it is not helping the cause because a weak man was hijacked by our enemies and now they will say that he was intimidated.It was very obvious that the guy didn't have any more facts then the rest of us...I saw that.Now our enemies use their tool against us again.Refusing to appear before a court that you believe has no jurisdiction is one of the oldest and most respected tactics in the book. Had Israel appeared before Goldstone and (as is likely) had the same conclusion been reached, Israel would have no avenue of appeal

Natalie Wood claims that Richard Goldstone's retraction of the infamous report that bears his name is nothing more than an attempt to regain acceptance into the Jewish community.

Indeed, Israel’s Ynet News reported that his decision was influenced by the constant harassment and cascades of threatening letters and emails he received in the wake of the report which bears his name.
Goldstone’s friend, Dr. Alon Liel says the ‘hell’ that he endured contributed to his decision to write his retraction.
"When Israel decided to boycott him, it was an overwhelming insult. 'I'm a Jewish judge, a respected Zionist – and Israel doesn't trust me?', Liel quoted his friend as saying. He was a broken man.
"I'm not saying that the threats he received and the hell he went through are what made him publish his article, but there is no doubt in my mind that it influenced his decision," says Liel.

Alon Liel. Former Director General of the Foreign Ministry. What a perfect soulmate for Goldstone. Alon Liel, who tried to pretend that Israel bears no responsibility or obligation to Jonathan Pollard. Alon Liel, who tried to trick the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee into believing that Bashar al-Assad wants peace and it's all our fault that we don't have it. Alon Liel, who urged then-Education Minister Comrade Yuli Tamir to prevent Israeli students from hiking in the Golan. Yes, Alon Liel is a perfect soulmate for Goldstone. A mendacious shmuck.
But I digress. Let's go back to Goldstone. It seems things aren't quite working out as planned.

While his unexpected intellectual somersault has caused much cynical mirth on social networking sites, it has generated even more serious anger. Thus far his efforts at social rehabilitation have been thwarted.
...
Moreover, far from welcoming the prodigal back into the bosom of his extended ‘family’, the international Jewish community is considering further social ostracism.

Bwahahahahaha.
Wood also cites unnamed "other lawyers" who say that Israel should have argued its case in front of Goldstone. You've got to be kidding. Refusing to appear before a court that you believe has no jurisdiction is one of the oldest and most respected tactics in the book. Had Israel appeared before Goldstone and (as is likely) had the same conclusion been reached, Israel would have no avenue of appeal, and it would be far less likely that Goldstone would have written a retraction.
Goldstone is a long way from re-acceptance into the Jewish community. And deservedly so. Unlike the kapos of the Nazi era, he cannot even claim that he did what he did to save his own life.

via israelmatzav.blogspot.com

OK, Goldstone Recanted--Now What? 

So now, Judge Goldstone writes an op-ed in the Washington Post where he admits that the Israeli military did NOT intentionally target civilians in Gaza.

But beyond the obvious disgust, there is one part of his “magnum oops” that you might have missed.

About the original report, he now writes “Our report found evidence of potential war crimes and “possibly crimes against humanity.”

Oh really?

“Potential” war crimes?

“Possibly” crimes against humanity?

Excuse me. I think that I have a real “potential” to be sick and “possibly” throw up.

I went back and looked through the 500 plus page report. There are dozens of accusations of specific “war crimes” that Israel violated. Then I did a word search for the word “potential.” Guess how many times Goldstone labeled his accusations as only “potential” war crimes? None. There was no doubt expressed in the report about Israel’s actions. “Possible crimes against humanity?” Nope.

It’s as if Goldstone is now saying “well, back then I just didn’t know if Israel committed war crimes. But you know, looking back, I don’t think they did.”

Judge Goldstone, Your Honor, excuse me, but you actually sounded certain in your report’s conclusions when you wrote:

(b) . Incidents involving the killing of civilians:

1718. The Mission found numerous instances of deliberate attacks on civilians and civilian objects (individuals, whole families, houses, mosques) in violation of the fundamental international humanitarian law principle of distinction, resulting in deaths and serious injuries.

In these cases the Mission found that the protected status of civilians was not respected and the attacks were intentional, in clear violation of customary law reflected in article 51(2) and 75 of the First AP, article 27 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and articles 6 and 7 of ICCPR. In some cases the Mission additionally concluded that the attack was also launched with the intention of spreading terror among the civilian population.

Did some UN intern leave out the words ”potential” and “possible” when he typed that up for you? Were you so busy looking up all the specific violations of international law that you somehow forget to add that you were not 100% certain when you accused the Israeli army of: deliberately attacking Palestinian civilians in Gaza with one of the goals to spread terror among the population.

read the whole thing via cifwatch.com

Hina Jilani, a member of the original Goldstone Commission. In response to a question from the Middle East Monitor as to whether Goldstone expressed regret in his op-ed in the Washington Post, Jilani replied:

Absolutely not; no process or acceptable procedure would invalidate the UN Report; if it does happen, it would be seen as a 'suspect move.

No process or procedure at all?

Back in 2009, Goldstone made it clear at a news conference that what they found:

The mission concluded that actions amounting to war crimes and possibly in some respect crimes against humanity were committed by the Israel Defense Forces.

Now Goldstone is saying that this key assumption underlying the Goldstone Report is wrong.

Jilani is the expert--and she says that there is no process or procedure that would invalidate the report. But putting aside process and procedure, does Jilani really mean that false conclusions--such as that Israel intentionally targeted civilians--would not invalidate the report?

via daledamos.blogspot.com

Another Look At Colonel Richard Kemp--The Man Goldstone Purposely Ignored

There was no reliance on Col. Kemp mainly because the Report did not deal with the issues he raised regarding the problems of conducting military operations in civilian areas and second-guessing decisions made by soldiers and their commanding officers in the fog of war. The Mission avoided having to do so in the incidents it decided to investigate.“
Richard Goldstone in letter to Maurice Ostroff

Of course, anyone who has had even a cursory look at the report knows that that is exactly what the Goldstone Report did: deal with the issues he raised regarding the problems of conducting military operations in civilian areas and second-guessing decisions made by soldiers and their commanding officers in the fog of war.
Let's face it. Goldstone is not saying anything in his Friday mea culpa that we didn't already know.
If he had listened to Colonel Richard Kemp in the beginning instead of ignoring his testimony, Goldstone could have avoided having to backtrack now.
Here are 2 videos of what Kemp said:

BBC: Former British Army Colonel Richard Kemp Discusses IDF Gaza Ops

British Colonel: "The IDF Did More to Safeguard Civilians Than Any Other Army"

via daledamos.blogspot.com

Posted via email from noahdavidsimon's posterous

More brilliance from our friends in the Pacific Northwest: Predictable:

What the hell is wrong with these so called "Progressive" witches in the North West?

Salem News didn't have a problem with his South African credentials when he was attacking Jews.
Anti-semites now attack Goldstone:

From the nutty-far-left Salem News:

Many of us knew something wasn't right with Richard Goldstone from the beginning. His seeming honesty was too good to be true.
He is the experienced former judge of the Constitutional Court of South Africa and former Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, who investigated the extended attack on Gaza's civilian population in the winter of 2008 and 2009 that left more than 1400 dead, most of whom were civilian, known as 'Operation Cast Lead'.
Considering the bond that ultimately exists between Zionist Jews, the selection of Goldstone as the man to head an investigation of Israel's Gaza War Crimes was a little like having Newt Gingrich investigate Republican wrongdoing.
...And this leads to the ultimate point about Goldstone and that is that no Zionist Jew from a country that practices apartheid so recently, should have been allowed to head the investigation.

via elderofziyon.blogspot.com

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#Goldstone News Briefs

Released terrorist Marwan Barghouti claimed Judge Richard Goldstone's retraction regarding his report on Israel and war crimes during the 2008 conflict in the Gaza Strip "serves the Israeli occupation."

Barghouti said he is certain Goldstone stands behind his report: "He's sure of what he wrote in the report. I believe he doesn't regret it."

Lieberman:
Truth finally sinking in 
Photo: Noam Moscowitz

Netanyahu:
Israeli authorities worthy 
Photo: Gil Yohanan

Lieberman also responds to judge's regret over report on Gaza war, says two years of work undermining it paid off. 'Now it is clear that IDF is moral army,' he says, adding that UN Human Rights Council's decisions on Israel are no longer valid

via ynetnews.com

Israeli officials expressed satisfaction Saturday with Judge Richard Goldstone's regret for his report on Operation Cast Lead in Gaza.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called on the UN to retract the Goldstone report. "Everything we said was proven to be true. Israel did not willfully harm civilians," Netanyahu explained, adding, "Israel's investigating authorities are worthy, while Hamas investigated nothing. The fact that Goldstone withdrew his conclusions must lead to the retraction of the report once and for all."

Netanyahu added that "the biggest absurdity is that the United Nation's Human Rights Council initiated the report, and one of its members was Gaddafi's Libya. Therefore we must toss this report into the trash can of history ."

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman told Ynet that "the truth is clear, and cannot be questioned".

via ynetnews.com

No foregone conclusion? Of the three other panelists besides Goldstone, one had already accused Israel of war crimes before the investigation and (verdict first, trial later), and another is so wildly anti-Israel that he holds an acknowledged grudge against Israel for purportedly murdering Irish U.N. peacekeepers (an event that never happened), and who also disclaimed his willingness to give any credence to photographic evidence of Hamas crimes presented by Israel. Goldstone himself was serving at the time as a board member of Human Rights Watch, which has hardly shown itself to be a neutral observer of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. And indeed, NGO Monitor has shown that big chunks of the Report’s accusations were lifted from unsubstantiated HRW material.
Goldstone apparently is starting to regret his role in the whole fiasco, and it’s certainly amusing to read various anti-Israel blogs that formerly lauded Goldstone as a hero for speaking truth to power now worrying about the “damage” he is doing to their cause. The key lines in his op-ed: while “the crimes allegedly committed by Hamas were intentional,” “civilians were not intentionally targeted [by Israel] as a matter of policy.”
But Goldstone agreed to lead a kangaroo court appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Council, which includes such human rights stalwarts as China, Cuba, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. Penance is always welcome, but Goldstone will go down in history as the head kangaroo.

via volokh.com

"The price of dealing (with the report) over the past few years was worth it," Lieberman said, adding that Goldstone's backtracking renders all decisions by UN Human Rights Council about Israel null and void.

"If I had known then what I know now, the Goldstone Report would have been a different document," the South African judge, who had accused Israel of committing war crimes in Gaza, wrote in an article carried by the Washington Post.

Lieberman took credit for the change of heart, explaining that his ministry had been hard at work attempting to undermine the report's conclusions. "We sent letters and documents about it, and I think it is finally sinking in," he said.

"Today it is clear to everyone that the IDF is the most moral army. I think there will be a dramatic change. Everyone understands that there is no place here for any intervention."

Israel refused to cooperate with the UN probe headed by Goldstone in 2009, and the judge expressed his dismay at the fact that this altered the results. "Israel’s lack of cooperation with our investigation meant that we were not able to corroborate how many Gazans killed were civilians and how many were combatants," he wrote.

Lieberman recounted the debates that led to Israel's decision at the time. "There were many arguments," he said. "Finally I managed to convince everyone that if we reveal to Goldstone our operational and political considerations, and how the army and defense and intelligence services work, everyone will begin demanding such information. We preferred to deal with the report without taking them into our confidence."

The foreign minister added that the report still has repercussions today. "People are unaware of this, but after the Goldstone report there were another two reports, all of them considering the effects of Goldstone," he said.

"All of them reached the same conclusion: There was no intentional fire on civilians and the justice system in Israel is reliable and serious, and investigates itself. Goldstone mentions 400 cases that Israel reviewed, while Hamas did not review a single case. Intentional fire on civilians is a war crime," Lieberman added.

'Council says nothing on Iran, Sudan'

"The third conclusion that Goldstone reaches in the article is that in actuality the Human Rights Council has become an anti-Israel body whose whole agenda is to degrade the State of Israel."

In his own opinion, the foreign minister said, the council deals in "attempts to persecute and libel Israel."

"This organization is busy with Israel as it is never busy with Iran, Sudan, or North Korea. As of this day, there is no longer any validity to any conclusion or debate about Israel in the Human Rights Council," he said.

"The State of Israel is not Syria, it's not the Ivory Coast, it is a state in which all of the systems work and everyone makes decisions according to the norms accepted around the world, and according to international law."

Defense Minister Ehud Barak was also pleased with Goldstone's admission. "We have always said that the IDF is a moral army that operates according international law, with extraordinary standards in the fight against terror activated by Hamas in Gaza against the citizens of Israel," he said.

Barak added that in addition to his article, Goldstone should also make sure to make his conclusions known to international bodies affected by "his false and distorted" report. "Only in this manner will there truly be partial reparation for the damage caused," he said.

IDF: Judge's Jewish morals kicked in

The IDF's top brass was also pleased with Goldstone's change of heart. IDF Spokesman Brigadier-General Avi Benayahu told Ynet that "apparently his Jewish morals and professional honor eventually prompted him to tell the world the truth about what happened during the operation, a truth we have long known".

"We have always felt total faith that the operational inquiries within the army are reliable and truthful. We are open to all criticism and claims and know how to probe ourselves, and we rejected the baseless criticism that appeared in the Goldstone report."

A number of inquiries led to punishment. In one case, two Givati soldiers were convicted of using a boy as a human shield in Gaza, and were sentenced to three months in prison. But the report accused many innocent soldiers of wrongdoing as well, another army official explained.

"This is an important seal of legitimacy for many whom the report slandered, through no wrongdoing of their own, some of whom were shamed by it," he said. "It's too bad most of them have already been discharged and did not receive this authorization while still serving."

But Colonel Liron Libman, who heads the International Law Division at the Military Advocate General's Office, believes there is still difficult work ahead. He cites the 2010 annual report, which says that "there has been an increase in attempts to initiate criminal proceedings against Israeli officials" during the year.

The report adds that "intensive dealings with legal consequences" of the Gaza war are expected to continue throughout 2011.

via ynetnews.com

Livni Responds to Goldstone's Admission
Member of Knesset Tzipi Livni (Kadima) responded to Judge Richard Goldstone's regrets over his report criticizing Israel during Operation Cast Lead, saying: "The operation was important and justified, with or without Goldstone."

"Better late than never," she added. "But the rectification must be stronger than a newspaper article. The report was based on a fundamental failure and not a factual one."

Livni served as Israel's foreign minister during Operation Cast Lead

via israelnationalnews.com

By Richard Goldstone, Friday, April 1, 8:42 PM

We know a lot more today about what happened in the Gaza war of 2008-09 than we did when I chaired the fact-finding mission appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Council that produced what has come to be known as the Goldstone Report. If I had known then what I know now, the Goldstone Report would have been a different document.

The final report by the U.N. committee of independent experts — chaired by former New York judge Mary McGowan Davis — that followed up on the recommendations of the Goldstone Report has found that “Israel has dedicated significant resources to investigate over 400 allegations of operational misconduct in Gaza” while “the de facto authorities (i.e., Hamas) have not conducted any investigations into the launching of rocket and mortar attacks against Israel.”Our report found evidence of potential war crimes and “possibly crimes against humanity” by both Israel and Hamas. That the crimes allegedly committed by Hamas were intentional goes without saying — its rockets were purposefully and indiscriminately aimed at civilian targets.

The allegations of intentionality by Israel were based on the deaths of and injuries to civilians in situations where our fact-finding mission had no evidence on which to draw any other reasonable conclusion. While the investigations published by the Israeli military and recognized in the U.N. committee’s report have established the validity of some incidents that we investigated in cases involving individual soldiers, they also indicate that civilians were not intentionally targeted as a matter of policy.

For example, the most serious attack the Goldstone Report focused on was the killing of some 29 members of the al-Simouni family in their home. 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. While the length of this investigation is frustrating, it appears that an appropriate process is underway, and I am confident that if the officer is found to have been negligent, Israel will respond accordingly. The purpose of these investigations, as I have always said, is to ensure accountability for improper actions, not to second-guess, with the benefit of hindsight, commanders making difficult battlefield decisions.
While I welcome Israel’s investigations into allegations, I share the concerns reflected in the McGowan Davis report that few of Israel’s inquiries have been concluded and believe that the proceedings should have been held in a public forum. Although the Israeli evidence that has emerged since publication of our report doesn’t negate the tragic loss of civilian life, I regret that our fact-finding mission did not have such evidence explaining the circumstances in which we said civilians in Gaza were targeted, because it probably would have influenced our findings about intentionality and war crimes.
Israel’s lack of cooperation with our investigation meant that we were not able to corroborate how many Gazans killed were civilians and how many were combatants. The Israeli military’s numbers have turned out to be similar to those recently furnished by Hamas (although Hamas may have reason to inflate the number of its combatants).
As I indicated from the very beginning, I would have welcomed Israel’s cooperation. The purpose of the Goldstone Report was never to prove a foregone conclusion against Israel. I insisted on changing the original mandate adopted by the Human Rights Council, which was skewed against Israel. I have always been clear that Israel, like any other sovereign nation, has the right and obligation to defend itself and its citizens against attacks from abroad and within. Something that has not been recognized often enough is the fact that our report marked the first time illegal acts of terrorism from Hamas were being investigated and condemned by the United Nations. I had hoped that our inquiry into all aspects of the Gaza conflict would begin a new era of evenhandedness at the U.N. Human Rights Council, whose history of bias against Israel cannot be doubted.
Some have charged that the process we followed did not live up to judicial standards. To be clear: Our mission was in no way a judicial or even quasi-judicial proceeding. We did not investigate criminal conduct on the part of any individual in Israel, Gaza or the West Bank. We made our recommendations based on the record before us, which unfortunately did not include any evidence provided by the Israeli government. Indeed, our main recommendation was for each party to investigate, transparently and in good faith, the incidents referred to in our report. McGowan Davis has found that Israel has done this to a significant degree; Hamas has done nothing.
Some have suggested that it was absurd to expect Hamas, an organization that has a policy to destroy the state of Israel, to investigate what we said were serious war crimes. It was my hope, even if unrealistic, that Hamas would do so, especially if Israel conducted its own investigations. At minimum I hoped that in the face of a clear finding that its members were committing serious war crimes, Hamas would curtail its attacks. Sadly, that has not been the case. Hundreds more rockets and mortar rounds have been directed at civilian targets in southern Israel. That comparatively few Israelis have been killed by the unlawful rocket and mortar attacks from Gaza in no way minimizes the criminality. The U.N. Human Rights Council should condemn these heinous acts in the strongest terms.
In the end, asking Hamas to investigate may have been a mistaken enterprise. So, too, the Human Rights Council should condemn the inexcusable and cold-blooded recent slaughter of a young Israeli couple and three of their small children in their beds.
I continue to believe in the cause of establishing and applying international law to protracted and deadly conflicts. Our report has led to numerous “lessons learned” and policy changes, including the adoption of new Israel Defense Forces procedures for protecting civilians in cases of urban warfare and limiting the use of white phosphorus in civilian areas. The Palestinian Authority established an independent inquiry into our allegations of human rights abuses — assassinations, torture and illegal detentions — perpetrated by Fatah in the West Bank, especially against members of Hamas. Most of those allegations were confirmed by this inquiry. Regrettably, there has been no effort by Hamas in Gaza to investigate the allegations of its war crimes and possible crimes against humanity.
Simply put, the laws of armed conflict apply no less to non-state actors such as Hamas than they do to national armies. Ensuring that non-state actors respect these principles, and are investigated when they fail to do so, is one of the most significant challenges facing the law of armed conflict. Only if all parties to armed conflicts are held to these standards will we be able to protect civilians who, through no choice of their own, are caught up in war.
The writer, a retired justice of the Constitutional Court of South Africa and former chief prosecutor of the U.N. International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, chaired the U.N. fact-finding mission on the Gaza conflict.

via washingtonpost.com