UN council: Goldstone regret not enough to rescind Gaza war report
'UN reports are not canceled on the basis of an op-ed in a newspaper,' UN Human Rights Council spokesman says, adding Goldstone has not submitted official request to withdraw the report.
By The Associated Press Tags: Israel news UN Gaza Richard Goldstone Gaza warThe United Nations Human Rights Council said Monday that it would continue to treat the report written by former Judge Richard Goldstone about Israel's incursion into Gaza as legitimate, despite his recently voiced regret regarding some of his damning allegations.
A spokesman for the UN rights council said for the report to be withdrawn Goldstone would have to submit a formal request to the Geneva-based body, which he has not done.
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In this June 3, 2009, photo, UN investigator Richard Goldstone visits the destroyed house where members of the Samouni family were killed during the Gaza war. |
| Photo by: AP |
"UN reports are not canceled on the basis of an op-ed in a newspaper," spokesman Cedric Sapey told The Associated Press.
"Various resolutions passed by the Geneva-based council and the UN General Assembly in New York would also have to be repealed by those bodies," he said.
Writing in a Washington Post column published on Friday, Goldstone wrote "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 UN Human Rights Council that produced what has come to be known as the Goldstone Report." He added that "If I had known then what I know now, the Goldstone Report would have been a different document."
The UN rights council commissioned the investigation of the Gaza war shortly after the incursion which left over 1,400 Palestinian militants and civilians dead. Israel has blamed Hamas for the heavy civilian toll, saying the militant group staged attacks from heavily populated residential areas, as well as mosques and schools.
The Goldstone report, released in September 2009, concluded that both Israel and Hamas committed potential war crimes and possible crimes against humanity.
The findings triggered outrage in Israel and a personal campaign against Goldstone - a respected South African Jewish jurist with close ties to Israel.
Following Goldstone's Friday op-ed, Israel has called for the report to be withdrawn.
"Everything that we said proved to be true," said Netanyahu. "Israel did not intentionally target civilians and it has proper investigatory bodies. In contrast, Hamas intentionally directed strikes toward innocent civilians and did not conduct any kind of probe."
Goldstone's decision to reconsider the conclusions of the report came as a surprise to at least one other member of the four-person panel that authored the document.
"I probably didn't expect to see the comments he made, to be honest," Desmond Travers told the AP in a telephone interview, adding he had not been consulted beforehand.
Travers, a former officer in the Irish Armed Forces and an expert on international criminal investigations, said he hadn't seen the Israeli investigative reports that prompted Goldstone to backtrack on parts of his conclusion, though he acknowledged it might be valid to do so.
"But the tenor of the report in its entirety, in my opinion, stands," Travers said.
Human rights groups said regardless of the intention, Israeli officers should still be held responsible for indiscriminately targeting areas where civilians were present.
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Yet I support goldstones right to officially retract and show evidence contrary to his report. However I don't think he will. I think goldstone still stands by the report, the op Ed is just a move to get himself reintegrated so he can go to his grandsons bar mitzvah etc.
That would be a much better idea than trying to justify the unjustifiable. Any PR pro will tell you that you can't turn a sow's ear into a silk purse.
In the days before the Gaza op began, Israle changed the rules of engagement (ROE). This is the guidance telling the IDF soldiers what they may shoot at. The ROE was "expanded" to include any person or building or other target which the IDF man or men felt to be "threatening". This effectively opened up Gaza into a free fire zone in which there were no "illegal" targets. This is what led to the slaughter of civilians. This change was well reported in Haaretz, although they seem to have completely forgotten about it now. The issue of whether the IDF targetted a thousand civilians or just killed them accidently is not the issue. This is something that Israel can obfuscate and defend against. The changing of the ROE to include every person in Gaza is something done at the highest levels of the IDF and the government. It cannot be defended. In the end, Israel got their wish, killing well over a thousand Palestinians with virtually no IDF casualties. Will any Haaretz reporter ever write about the changing of the ROE? Did Israel change the ROE back to what is was after the Gaza op? People should not get so wrapped up in Goldstone. This is a fake issue meant to distract attention from the real issue. This happens a lot with Israel.
The Goldstone investigation was conducted while Israel was boycotting the commission's work. The Israeli position was only received by the investigators through newspaper announcements and other public reports. On the other hand, Hamas cooperated fully. No wonder, the Report came out harder on Israel than it should have. But Goldstone is a judge, and judgment must be rendered even if the accused prefers not to offer a defense (as did Barghouti before an Israeli court). Now Goldstone has more detailed answers by Israel. Being a decent man, he states that his Report would have been different with the latest news. Could the Goldstone Report be retracted? No way. 1. Some accusations of war crimes seem to remain valid, such as the attack on policemen and the destruction of essential public installations such as a sewage treatment plant. 2. Goldstone complains in his op-ed that most Israeli investigations did not conclude yet and that their progress is frustratingly slow. Hence, the vast majority of his charges against IDF behavior are still without answer. 3. Goldstone is no longer an investigator but merely a "private citizen". He made his comments without having the ability to go over the details of the Israeli claims and subject them to "cross-examination". His announcement is the announcement of a decent man, but no longer "official". It gives Netanyahu a chance for a promising PR campaign, but as far as the Report itself, Netanyahu failed by not cooperating with a decent Jew and ZIONIST like Goldstone.
Otherwise make him testify before the council again, This time without any lies against the State of Israel and the IDF! Still the most moral army in the world!