De Israelische Oorlogsmisdaden 101

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion?pid=476734
=====================================


The Goldstone Report on Gaza
by The Nation

The recently released UN Human Rights Council fact-finding mission on
the December-January Gaza conflict, released on the eve of Barack
Obama's attempt to jump-start comprehensive Israeli-Palestinian
negotiations, was but the latest in a series of investigations, most
of them by human rights organizations like Human Rights Watch and
Amnesty International.

Like its predecessors, the so-called Goldstone report, named after
chief investigator Richard Goldstone, is devastating in its critique
of Israeli actions: indiscriminate use of firepower; deliberate
attacks on civilians and civilian structures, including hospitals,
schools, mosques, water and sewage plants, and rescue vehicles; use
of white phosphorus munitions in built-up areas; use of human
shields; abusive treatment of detainees; imposition of a blockade on
Gaza before and after the attack itself˜the report concludes that
Israel violated international humanitarian law, committed „grave
breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention in respect of wilful
killings and wilfully causing great suffering to protected persons,‰
and war crimes, possibly even crimes against humanity. The courageous
Israeli journalist Gideon Levy summed it up well in Haaretz: it was
„an unrestrained assault on a besieged, totally unprotected civilian
population which showed almost no signs of resistance during this
operation.‰

Perhaps most damning of all was the testimony of some thirty Israeli
veterans of the operation gathered by the organization Breaking the
Silence, published in a booklet in July and cited by the Goldstone
report. According to the booklet‚s introduction, „The majority of the
soldiers who spoke with us are still serving in their regular
military units and turned to us in deep distress at the moral
deterioration of the IDF.∑ The stories of this publication prove that
we are not dealing with the failures of individual soldiers, and
attest instead to failures in the application of values primarily on
a systemic level.‰ The testimony is chilling: „Fire power was
insane‰; „if you see any signs of movement at all, you shoot. These,
essentially, were the rules of engagement. Shoot if you like‰;
„Houses were demolished everywhere.∑ We didn‚t see a single house
that was not hit‰; „whole neighborhoods were simply razed because
four houses in the area served to launch Qassam rockets‰; „You know
what? You feel like a child playing around with a magnifying glass,
burning up ants. Really. A 20-year-old kid should not be doing such
things to people.‰

Predictably, the Goldstone report was met by a wave of angry
denunciations from the Israeli government˜which had refused to
cooperate with the investigators˜and most of the Israeli media. The
mainstream media here have downplayed the investigation‚s
significance; news coverage has been sparse, and not one major US
daily has seen fit to editorialize on it (unless you count a nasty
little screed from the New York Daily News calling the report a
„blood libel against Israel‰). And US pundits and politicians--
including UN ambassador Susan Rice, who called it „unbalanced, one-
sided and basically unacceptable‰--have been overwhelmingly critical.

But it‚s not so easy to dismiss these findings. For one thing, the
nearly 600-page report is carefully documented and comprehensive, and
is based on field visits, public hearings, almost 200 individual
interviews, photos, videos, satellite imagery and a review of more
than 300 other reports. For another, its head, Goldstone, is one of
the most respected and experienced international jurists, having
served as a justice on South Africa‚s Constitutional Court and chief
UN prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunals for the former
Yugoslavia and Rwanda.

And then there are Goldstone‚s personal connections: he‚s Jewish and,
according to his daughter, herself an ardent Zionist who lived in
Israel for six months, he‚s „a Zionist and loves Israel.‰ Indeed, she
said of her father, who serves on the Board of Governors of Hebrew
University, „I know that if he thought what he did would not somehow
be for the sake of peace for everyone in Israel or that it would have
hindered such efforts, he would not have accepted the job.‰

Before taking it on, Goldstone insisted on expanding the mission‚s
mandate so that it cover Palestinian acts; far from being one-sided,
the report concluded that Hamas rocket and mortar barrages on
southern Israel were „indiscriminate attacks upon the civilian
population,‰ acts that „would constitute war crimes and may amount to
crimes against humanity.‰ International law expert (and Nation
editorial board member) Richard Falk has concluded that „no credible
international commission could reach any set of conclusions other
than those reached by the Goldstone Report on the central
allegations.‰

Falk points out that there are good reasons for Israel‚s panicked
reaction. In addition to the report‚s balance and the credibility of
its chief, Goldstone recommends that Israel and Hamas carry out
serious, comprehensive investigations of their own into the alleged
crimes, and that if they do not do so within six months, the UN
Security Council should consider referring the matter to the
International Criminal Court in The Hague. That‚s highly unlikely,
given US veto power in the Security Council. But the report will
further diminish Israel‚s reputation and will probably strengthen the
growing international boycott, divestment and sanctions movement. In
his column on the report, Gideon Levy darkly concludes, „On the eve
of the Jewish New Year, Israel, deservedly, is becoming an outcast
and detested country. We must not forget it for a minute.‰