Israel rejects 'War Crimes' verdict
Byrnzie
Posts: 21,037
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/ma ... war-report
Israel dismisses UN accusation of 'grave offences' in Gaza war
Report claiming deliberate targeting of UN civilians and institutions is biased, Israel says
* guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 5 May 2009 14.11 BST
'Israel has dismissed as "tendentious" and "patently biased" an unpublished UN inquiry into Israel's conduct during the January war in Gaza.
The UN investigation is the first into the war and looked only at deaths, injuries and damage caused at UN sites in Gaza during the three-week conflict. Some of the findings may be released today.
According to Israeli media reports, a senior foreign ministry official has already received a draft copy of the report. One newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth, was briefed on some of its contents and reported that it accuses Israel of "grave offences", including "disproportionate shooting and deliberately hitting UN civilians and institutions". The paper said the report "determined unequivocally: Israel deliberately fired at UN institutions even though it knew it was forbidden".
The UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, was due to send his response to a summary of the report to the security council, Israel's foreign ministry said.
Yedioth said the report's main recommendation was to call for an independent investigative committee to look more deeply into the war and to determine whether Israel violated international law. Israel's foreign ministry said it believes Ban will not take up that recommendation.
The document has been compiled by a board of inquiry – a team of four 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. It is still unclear if the full report will be made public.
Israel's foreign ministry attempted to pre-empt the report today, saying the Israeli military had already investigated its own conduct during the war and "proved beyond doubt" that it did not fire 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".
International human rights groups, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, have accused both Israel's military and Palestinian militant groups of serious violations of international law and possible war crimes during the conflict.
The UN board of inquiry report has a limited scope. It is confined to investigating death or injuries or damage at UN buildings or during UN operations. The UN human rights council is also to dispatch a fact-finding mission to Gaza, but Israel has already suggested it will not co-operate, saying the council is biased.
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isn't that what happened to Saddam when he violated UN mandates?
like it will ever happen, or should, but that's how they treated Iraq after its invasion of Kuwait.
allies get immunity for war crimes.
Yep:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/ma ... ed-nations
UN accuses Israel of Gaza 'negligence or recklessness'
Inquiry finds Israel responsible for deaths, injuries and damage to UN buildings
* 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".
The most serious incident investigated took place on 6 January, near a UN boys' preparatory school in Jabaliya that was being used as a shelter for hundreds of Palestinians who had fled their homes to escape the fighting. The Israeli military had fired several 120mm mortar rounds in the "immediate vicinity" of the school, killing between 30 and 40 Palestinians, the inquiry found.
Although Israel at the time said Hamas had fired mortars from within the school, the inquiry found this as not true: there had been no firing from within the compound and there were no explosives in the school.
It held Israel responsible for the attack and said the deaths of civilians should be "assessed in accordance with ... international humanitarian law." It also called for a formal acknowledgement from Israel that its allegations about Palestinian militants being present in the school were untrue.
The other incidents investigated were:
29 December
The headquarters of the UN political mission in Gaza was damaged when Israeli air strikes hit the presidential compound next door. Staff were on site, but were protected in a bunker and not injured. The inquiry held the Israeli government responsible for the damage.
5 January
An Israeli air strike hit the UN Asma elementary school in Gaza City, where hundreds more Palestinians were sheltering. The missile killed three young men who had been walking to the bathroom in the school compound. The inquiry found no weapons or ammunition were being stored in the school, and that the men had been going to the toilet and not taking part in military activity. The attack was "an egregious breach of the inviolability of the United Nations premises", the inquiry said, again holding Israel responsible for the deaths and damage.
6 January
An Israeli air strike damaged the UN Bureij health centre, injuring nine people. The inquiry said the air strike had targeted and destroyed an apartment opposite the centre. It held Israel responsible for the damage to the health centre, and noted that the UN had been given no advance warning of the attack.
8 January
Israeli soldiers fired at a UN convoy, damaging one of the vehicles in Ezbet Abed Rabou. The marked convoy, flying a UN flag, had been cleared by the Israeli military to travel out to pick up the dead body of a UN staff member.
15 January
The UN's main headquarters in Gaza was badly damaged when it was hit by several Israeli artillery shells, including some containing white phosphorus. The shelling continued despite warnings from the UN to the Israeli military, and fires caused serious damage to the UN warehouse. Three people were injured. The inquiry held Israel responsible and said the Israeli military had a "particularly high degree of responsibility" to ensure the safety of the UN headquarters.
17 January
Israeli 155mm artillery loaded with white phosphorus exploded early in the morning above the UN Beit Lahiya elementary school, where nearly 2,000 Palestinians were sheltering from the fighting. Two children, aged five and seven, were killed inside a classroom and their mother and cousin were seriously injured by shards of shell casings. Eleven others were also hurt. The inquiry held Israel responsible for the deaths, injuries and damage.
In one other case, damage worth around $29,000 was caused to a World Food Programme warehouse by a Palestinian militant group, probably Hamas. In the last case, a UN guard outside the gate of a UN girls' preparatory school in Khan Younis was killed on 29 December by shrapnel. The inquiry was unable to determine who was responsible.
'The Israeli Defence Minister, Ehud Barak, rejected the report, saying it was biased.
"We have the most moral army in the world," he said...'
"IDF [Israeli Defense Force] commanders and soldiers made every effort to avoid hurting uninvolved civilians."
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast ... un.report/
'..after a tank round struck near a house, a father and his two sons -- both younger than 11 -- emerged to look at the damage.
"As they exited their home, IDF soldiers shot and killed them (at the entrance to their house), with the daughter witnessing," the report said.
In the second, it said, "Israeli soldiers entered a family house in the Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City. Standing at the doorstep, they asked the male head of the household to come out and shot him dead, without warning, while he was holding his ID, hands raised up in the air, and then started to fire indiscriminately and without warning into the room where the rest of the family was huddled together.
"The eldest son was shouting in vain the word 'Children' in Hebrew to warn the soldiers. The shooting did not stop until everyone was lying on the floor. The mother and four of the brothers, aged 2-12 years, had been wounded, one of them, aged 4, fatally."
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/226/story/60853.html
Israeli troops killed Gaza children carrying white flag, witnesses say
'...they heard an Israeli solider calling for people to come out of their homes.
Abed Rabbo said he gathered his wife, their three daughters and his mother, Souad. Souad Abed Rabbo said that she tied a white robe around a mop handle and two of her granddaughters waved white headscarves as they walked outside.
When they opened the door, they saw an Israeli tank parked in their garden about 10 yards away.
"We were waiting for them to give us an order," Khaled said last week as he stood in the ruins of his home. "Then one came out of the tank and started to shoot."
Souad Abed Rabbo said she was shot as she pushed her son back inside and her granddaughters fell on the stairs. When the shooting was over, she said, 2-year-old Amal and 7-year-old Souad were dead...'
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=91 ... =351020202
'Israel killed 437 kids in blockaded Gaza'
Sat, 11 Apr 2009
'Israel's three-week war on the Gaza Strip left 437 children dead and 1872 more wounded, the Ministry of Social Affairs in Gaza has said.
Ahmad Al Kurd, Minister of Social Affairs, said on Friday that the Israeli army targeted women and children, and that its shelling targeted homes, hospitals, educational facilities and even mosques, International Middle East Media Center reported.
The killing and wounding of large numbers of children proves that the Israeli forces targeted the civilian areas, he added.
According to the report, Israel's offensive to the blockaded strip also left 1500 children orphans, as they lost a parent or both parents in the attacks, and thousands of them suffered psychological problems due to witnessing scenes of death and destructions.
Israel has been accused of committing war crimes during the war in Gaza, including the use of deadly white phosphorus shells in densely populated civilian areas and the use of civilians as human shields.
Israel initially denied using the controversial weapon. However, mounting evidence later forced Israeli officials to admit having employed the shells.
The three-week Israeli assault killed 1,330 Palestinians and wounded 5,450 others -- a large number of them women and children.'
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 79727.html
UN retreats after Israel hits out at Gaza report
Secretary General rejects further investigation into 'reckless' military offensive
By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem
Wednesday, 6 May 2009
'The UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon bowed to pressure from Israel yesterday by trying to limit the impact of a comprehensive critique accusing its military of “recklessness or negligence” in this year’s Gaza offensive.
The official UN report – which Mr Ban himself commissioned – criticised the Israel Defence Forces for breaching the inviolability of UN premises, causing deaths, injuries and damage in seven incidents involving UN installations, and on occasions issuing untrue statements about what had happened.
But in a covering letter attached to his own 27-page summary of the report, leaked last night, the secretary-general bluntly rejected its recommendations for further investigations into whether Israel had breached international law during the offensive, including by its use of white phosphorus.
Mr Ban’s efforts to draw a line under the report – compiled by a UN board of inquiry headed by Ian Martin, the British former head of Amnesty and UN envoy to East Timor – followed an intensive diplomatic effort by Israel to minimise the damage of its findings.
The report says that the IDF was “involved in varying degrees of negligence or recklessness with regard to United Nations premises and to the safety of United Nations staff and other civilians within those premises, with consequent deaths, injuries, and extensive physical damage and loss of property”.
The incidents examined in depth by the inquiry include the mortar attack on 6 January which killed up to 40 civilians outside a UN school in Jabalya being used as a shelter, and the devastating white phosphorus assault on the UN’s field office compound on 15 January which caused extensive damage.
In both cases, says Mr Ban’s summary, the UN is seeking “formal acknowledgement” by the government of Israel that its public statements claiming that Palestinian militants fired from the installations, were “untrue and regretted”. The report also recommends pressing Israel for compensation for the families of dead and injured UN personnel in the attacks.
The report says that the co-ordinates of the Jabalya school had been given to the IDF and that it had been notified of its planned use as a shelter even before Operation Cast Lead began. It notes that at the time of the rport’s drafting a claim that Hamas militants had fired mortars from within the compound and that the school was booby trapped was still on the Israeli foreign ministry website. It adds: “The Board found that there was no fire from within the compound and no explosives within the school.”
The report effectively accuses Israeli forces of repeatedly breaching the principle that “UN personnel and all civilians within UN premises, as well as civilians in the immediate vicinity of those premises, are to be protected in accordance with the rules and principles of international humanitarian law”.
The report also says that the deaths of two children and the injuries caused to 13 other civilians at another UN school used as an improvised shelter on 17 January were “undisputedly” caused by the artillery firing of 155mm shells which contained white phosphorus wedges.
The report also examines other hitherto little reported incidents, including an attack on the Asma UNRWA school in Gaza City, in which three young men, all members of a families taking shelter, were killed as a result of an “undisputed” single aerial missile. In another on a building opposite a UN health centre in the Bureij refugee after which one patient died, there was no warning, the report says. It says that one attack, on an installation in Karni, was probably the work of Hamas.
The report recommends further investigation of other both UN and non-UN related civilian deaths which have given rise to allegations of breaches of international humanitarian law by both the IDF and Hamas.
But in his covering letter Mr Ban says he is “carefully considering” what actions “if any” to take on the 11 recommendations by the inquiry team. Mr Ban goes out of his way to thank Israel for its co-operation in the inquiry. He makes a point – urged on him by Israeli ministers and officials – of speaking out against “continued and indiscriminate” attacks by Hamas. And he said: “I do not plan any further enquiries.”
Israel yesterday rejected the report’s findings and its Foreign Ministry says the inquiry board “has preferred the claims of Hamas, a murderous terror organisation, and by doing so has misled the world”. Defence Secretary Ehud Barak repeated that Israel has “the most moral army in the world” and laid full responsibility for casualties on Hamas.
Its easy to blame the jews, goddamn jews- right?
na.
its like anything...although every jew i've met has been very supportive of the racist regime running israel, still i believe that position is the minority. that most jewish people prefer peace. most people prefer peace, i believe, and the jews are no different. their leadership is something else.
it would be like if we hade a choice between Bush 2 or LBJ. either way we're fucked. that' what the Israelis get to choose from , come theri election day. far right or far right. nothing close to a choice.
and its fucked up.
Gaza is burning and the Israeli troops are printing t shirts with targets on babies foreheads, and everyone is all very pleased with themseleves for killing over 500 little kidswith gruesome phosphorous bombs and things like that.
somethings gotta give. this shit isn't gonna last long.
humanity is sick of violence and murder and torture, there are better ways to do things. and we will rise above tha madness. it can't go on forever.
Not forever.. just until the world ends.
“My next book tackles the big questions, for example, Why Are We Here? Every time I see Alan Dershowitz or Abraham Foxman, I ask myself this question” - Stephen Hawking
http://www.mininova.org/tor/2568554
Nice quote. Alan Dershowitz really is one of the most despicable human beings I've ever seen/heard. Watch the 'Democracy Now!' debate between Dershowitz and Finkelstein to see just what I mean:
Part 1: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 5870962994
Part 2: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 0692&hl=en
thanks for posting this. gonna check it out as soon as i get home.
he's talking about motive. According to him, Palestinian's target civilians intentionally-which may be true in some cases. But Israeli (although it kills 5 times as many civilians as the 'terrorists') doesn't deliberately target civilians (never mind official statements that state exactly its not only deliberate, but its policy).
According to him, even though Israel kills more innocent people than the Palestinians, they have a good reason for it, so its excusable.
His logic gets worse. He uses figuressaying that Israel stopped x amount of attacks and probably saved x amount of lives with the violence.....but if you use that logic....Israel fired thousands of shells from tanks and helicopters and so on that never hit anybody. If he's counting those casualties he needs to count the same from Israel. Which puts the numbers at even more inexcusable levels.
His premise is flawed from word one. His premise is that Israel has a right to defend itself with violence. Not true. Israel has a right to defend itself, and they should. They can defend themselves as the British did, when George Washington was trying to kill them. They left.
And his book is full of plagiarisms and falsifications.
It's interesting to note that he's a Harvard Professor. What does that say about the state of education in the U.S?
An interesting webpage here:
http://www.academicfreedomchicago.org/
'Academic Freedom Committee is a student organization at DePaul University that seeks to preserve academic freedom on campus. Recently, there have been a number of academic freedom infringements at DePaul. We are a group of students that have organized to bring attention to these events and work for those who have been silenced.'
Also:
http://www.counterpunch.org/menetrez04302007.html
Dershowitz v. Finkelstein: Who's Right and Who's Wrong?
By FRANK MENETREZ - Counterpunch - April 30, 2007
some cases? how about you tell the truth. Hamas's POLICY is to destroy Israel, civilians included. and while Israel absolutely kills civilians, where are these "official statements" that state its deliberate and policy?
Israel is not the good guy in the situation, but lets face it, you will excuse Hamas for killing civilians but not Israel. its impossible to debate this issue when you people feel Israel civilians, living on disputed land, ARE legitimate targets.
It's not disputed land. The settlements are illegal under international law.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nat ... lution_242
U.N Resolution 242
'Emphasizing the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war and the need to work for a just and lasting peace in which every State in the area can live in security'
(i) Withdrawal of Israel armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict;
(ii) Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and acknowledgement of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nat ... lution_242
Lord Caradon, the chief author of the resolution:
"It was from occupied territories that the [r]esolution called for withdrawal. The test was which territories were occupied. That was a test not possibly subject to any doubt as a matter of fact...East Jerusalem, the West Bank, Gaza, the Golan and Sinai were occupied in the 1967 conflict. I[t] was on withdrawal from occupied territories that the Resolution insisted."
http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/92.htm
The Fourth Geneva Convention - Article 49
'The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.'
Firstly, we're not talking about the beginning of mankind, were discussing contemporary realities. Israel is a member state of the United Nations. It has the same obligations and responsibilities as any other member state. I listed above some of the principles which it is obliged to adhere to. On the other hand it could just continue behaving in the manner of a rogue state and we can simply tear up every standard of justice which the world community purports to recognize and to follow. I'm sure that return to barbarism would suit your cause just fine.
Secondly. the land in question is only disputed by Israel. International law and the whole world, except Israel, recognizes that land as belonging to the Palestinians.
The fact that it's disputed by Israel is irrelevant. Have you ever heard of something called the law?
Israel claims it is their own, whilst the Palestinians along with the rest of the world, and according to international law, see it as belonging to the Palestinians. Therefore Israel needs to get the fuck out.
If I break into your home and claim it as my own, does that give me a right to your home?
Israel has no rightful claim to the land, and it never did.
why are you pretending like this is the first time in history a people have laid claim to a certain piece of land? second of all Israel simply isnt showing up and claiming the land. they have been there for thousands of years. maybe the Ottoman Turks should kick everyone out and take their land back? maybe the Roman Italians? maybe the Egyptians, how bout Syrians? or Persians?
'Zionism was from the start an ill-considered and menacing experiment in ethnic nationalism. Neither history nor religion could justify it. The Jews had no claim to Palestine and no right to build a state there. Their growing need for refuge may have provided some limited, inadequate, short-term moral sustenance for the Zionist project, but it could not render that project legitimate. The mere fact of later suffering cannot retroactively convert a wrong into a right: my attempt to usurp your land does not become legitimate simply because I am wrongly beaten by someone else, far away, when my project is near completion. Nor did the well founded desperation of the Jews during the Nazi era provide any justification for Zionism; at most it provided an excuse. If someone is murdering my family in Germany, that does not entitle me to your house in Boston, or my "people" to your country. All Jews fleeing Hitler were indeed entitled to some refuge. One might even suppose that it was the obligation of the whole world, including the Palestinians, to do what they could to provide such refuge. But this is not the whole story.
For one thing, those with ample means to provide refuge, and those who are responsible for the need, have by far the greater share of responsibility. The Palestinians fell into neither category. Even more important, there is an enormous difference between providing refuge and providing a sovereign state. No amount of danger or suffering requires this, and indeed it may conflict with the demand for refuge. Simply to control one's own affairs isn't always the safest alternative. Arguably, for instance, the Jews were safer in the United States, where they are not sovereign, than they ever were in Israel. This is not only a fact but was always a reasonable expectation, so the need for refuge is also no basis for Zionism...
If there are any great lessons to be learned from the Nazi era , they are to watch out for fascism, racism, and ethnic nationalism. Supporting Israel hardly embodies these lessons.'
At what point did I pretend that this is the first time in history a people have laid claim to a certain piece of land? Please direct me to my comment which states this.
Nazi Germany laid claim to Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, France, e.t.c. As far as they were concerned that land belonged to them. Therefore it was disputed. So what's your point?
A small number of Jews have lived in that area for thousands of years. What does this have to do with the Zionist goal of establishing ethnic sovereignty in the region?
The Ottoman Turks have no legal claim to the land, and neither do the Roman Italians, the Egyptians, or the Syrians, or Persians.
Still, it's always a good idea to try and drag a discussion into the realms of history and/or fantasy when you find that you have no argument.
Again, we're not talking about 2000 years ago. We're dealing with a contemporary situation.
Please go ahead and enlighten me with this 'other research and opinion' that you prize so highly.
they sure did lay claim to it. then a war was fought and they lost. had they won that war, maybe they will still own the land.
has everything to do with it.
so we should ignore history? sorry, thats not my style.
I dont know steve, you are a smart guy, go find it yourself. my point is that you post that same article over and over and over again. turn the page.
Unfortunately that's how some people around here actually think.
and giving another point of view besides support of Hamas = occupation apologists = genocide support = pro Zionism = anti Palastinian civillians.
well you get the point
the israelis have been losing the PR war for some time now ... there are fewer and fewer people who think like that thanks to bush ... but just as there are still people who would vote for him again and think he was a good president - you can't help them ...
really - unless someone can bring forth a reasonable point that says the current treatment of palestinians by israelis is a good thing for humanity - there really isn't a discussion here ... it's just baiting
O.k, for your benefit I'll repeat myself - as I also need to do by re-posting the same quotations - because you clearly miss the point, again and again, ad infinitum: Israel is a signatory to the U.N. Therefore it is obligated to adhere to the U.N charter. Alternatively, it could revert to barbarism of the type we witnessed in the 1930's and 1940's. It seems like you are in favour of such barbarism and lawlessness as long as it suits your own personal needs, although strangely, whenever anyone mentions 9/11 then you're the first one to begin barking about justice, and right and wrong.
Really? So the Muslim population living in America have a rightful claim to make the U.S an ethnic Arab sovereign state and to reduce the whites to the level of second class citizens?
You could have fooled me.