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US Berated for Shielding Israel on Gaza Killings
UNITED NATIONS - A U.S. decision to stall Security Council action against Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas for war crimes during the 22-day conflict in Gaza last December has come under heavy fire both from inside and outside the United Nations.
The Palestinian Authority's foreign minister, Riyad al-Malki, addresses the Security Council on Oct. 14, 2009. (Credit:UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe) Addressing the Security Council Wednesday, the chair of the 118-member Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Ambassador Maged Abdelaziz of Egypt urged the powerful 15-member political body to "seriously consider and act upon the recommendations" of the U.N. Fact Finding Mission headed by Justice Richard Goldstone.
But the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama says the charges of war crimes in the Goldstone report, which was released last month, should be within the purview of the Geneva-based Human Rights Council, not the Security Council in New York.
Despite reservations by Western nations, the Council agreed to hold a special meeting Wednesday on the Middle East: a meeting which provided member states with an opportunity to discuss the Goldstone report and focus on the serious violations of international human rights during the Gaza conflict, both by Israel and Hamas.
"That President Obama is receiving the Noble Peace prize after his failure to speak out during the Gaza war, and after his administration's protection of a state that has committed war crimes, is an abomination," Michael Ratner, president of the New York-based Centre for Constitutional Rights, told IPS.
The number of Palestinians killed during the conflict is estimated at between 1,387 and 1,417, mostly civilians, compared with four Israeli fatal casualties in southern Israel and nine soldiers killed during fighting, four of whom died as a result of friendly fire.
Ratner said one would hope that the United States would not block the referral of both Israel and Hamas to the International Criminal Court (ICC) for an investigation of war crimes committed in Gaza.
"Sadly, its conduct at the Human Rights Council [in Geneva] where it called the Goldstone report deeply flawed shows that it will again do all in its power to try and bury any investigation of Israel for war crimes," he added.
By doing so, Washington is giving Israel a green light to continue to commit atrocities, said Ratner, who heads the non-profit human rights litigation organisation.
The failure to refer the Gaza matter to the ICC undercuts any claim that the law is applied equally to Israel and the Palestinians, he noted.
"That the United States attacked the report, authored by Judge Goldstone, one of the pre-eminent jurists in the world, demonstrates that it is willing to debase both the law and a respected jurist in its effort to protect a client state, despite its crimes," Ratner declared.
The Goldstone report has recommended that the Security Council require Israel to report to it, within the next six months, on investigations and prosecutions it should carry out with regard to the violations cited in the report.
During the ruthless military operation, codenamed 'Operation Cast Lead', the Israelis destroyed houses, factories, wells, schools, hospitals, police stations and other public buildings.
The report also recommended that the Security Council should set up its own body of independent experts to report to it on the progress of the Israeli investigations and prosecutions.
"If the expert's reports do not indicate within six months that good faith, independent proceedings are taking place, the Security Council should refer the situation in Gaza to the Prosecutor in the International Criminal Court (ICC)," the report recommended.
The report also recommended that the same expert body report to the Security Council on proceedings undertaken by the relevant Gaza authorities with regard to the crimes committed by the Palestinian side.
But the report's strongest indictment is not against Hamas but against the state of Israel, which is accused of imposing a blockade on Gaza "amounting to collective punishment" carried out as part of a "systematic policy of progressive isolation and deprivation of the Gaza Strip".
Stephen Zunes, professor of politics and international studies at the University of San Francisco, told IPS the Obama administration and Congressional leaders of both parties appear to be continuing the policy of the administration of former U.S. President George W. Bush in ignoring and denouncing those who have the temerity to report violations of international humanitarian law by the United States or its allies.
"They are particularly concerned about the matter going before the International Criminal Court where those Palestinians and Israelis guilty of war crimes might actually face justice," he said.
The Obama administration appears determined that such war criminals be granted impunity, said Zunes, who is also chair of the Middle Eastern Studies Programme, and who has written extensively on the Security Council.
He said that although U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice had argued just a few months earlier during a U.N. debate on Darfur, Sudan that war crimes charges should never be sacrificed for political reasons, she is now claiming that similar action on the Gaza conflict could be an impediment to the peace process.
"It's ironic that the Obama administration is insisting that the issue stay confined to the U.N.'s Human Rights Council, which they have repeatedly labeled as anti-Israel," Zunes said.
U.S. officials recognise, however, that if the matter is taken to the Security Council, as the Goldstone Commission recommended, it would place debate on violations of international humanitarian law by a key U.S. ally before a body that, unlike the Human Rights Council, has an enforcement mechanism.
"It would also allow far greater media exposure of Israeli war crimes, the bulk of which were implemented using U.S. weapons systems and ordnance," he noted.
Yvonne Terlingen, Amnesty International representative at the United Nations, called for the prompt establishment of an independent committee of experts in international humanitarian law and human rights law to monitor and report.
Such a report, she said, should be within a strict time frame, to the Security Council and other U.N. bodies, on domestic legal and other measures taken by Israel and the authorities in Gaza to address accountability for violations of international humanitarian and human rights law during the Gaza conflict.
Last week, the Human Rights Council, prompted by the Palestinians, decided to defer a draft resolution that would have endorsed the recommendations in the Goldstone report.
That proposed draft resolution was expected to be taken up during the Council's next session in March 2010.
But the deferment created such a political uproar that it forced the Palestinians to do a dramatic turnaround: to support a meeting of the Security Council Wednesday and also a special session of the Human Rights Council on Thursday to discuss the Goldstone report.
Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, said the failure of the U.S. and European states to endorse the Goldstone report at the Human Rights Council meeting in Geneva "sent a terrible message that serious laws-of-war violations by allied states would be tolerated".
Addressing the Security Council Wednesday, U.S. Ambassador Alejandro Wolff made a predictable statement that the United States continues to "have serious concerns about the [Goldstone] report, its unbalanced focus on Israel, the overly broad scope of its recommendations, and its sweeping conclusions of law."
Nevertheless, he said, "We take the allegations in the report seriously."
"Israel has the institutions and the ability to carry out serious investigations of these allegations and we encourage it to do so," Wolff said.
He also said that Hamas "is a terrorist organisation and has neither the ability nor the willingness to examine its violations of human rights".
35 Comments so far
Show AllU.S. Ambassador Alejandro Wolff said that Hamas "is a terrorist organization and has neither the ability nor the willingness to examine its violations of human rights".
Just like the United States of America….
Nothing to see here. Just keep looking forward, no need to muddy the waters by looking back.
So what is your next crime against humanity? Why not think big, forget the petty stuff and take leadership by torpedoing Copenhagen in December?
BOYCOTT, DIVEST AND SANCTION THE CRIMINAL AND TERRORIST STATE OF ISRAEL!!!!! (FROM A CANADIAN CHRISTIAN!)
Boycotts don't work. The US has had a boycott of Cuba for 50 years and nothing happened. I agree with you about Israel, but boycotts aren't the answer. All it will do is stiffen Israel's resolve.
In order for a boycott to work they have to target what is IMPOTTANT to a local economy and or people.
Boycotts worked for South Africa.
Cuba never was a great exporter and was never a rich country therefore Boycotts do not work in Cuba.
Israel relies on exports .
GwNorth:
The boycott hasn't worked against the government of Cuba; however, it has devastated its people and left the infrastructure and economy in shambles so, yes, it has worked although, of course, not the way that the US would have liked it to. In these quagmires, it's always the people who suffer no matter what but they are always expendable by both, their own government and the foreign agressor.
Cuba wasn't recieving 3 billion a year and then had it cut by the US. Thats the kind of boycott I'm talking about and it would have an impact! but it does help to tell the kids in the mall who sell stuff from Israel that I have no plans to buy anything from there AND WHY!
Stopping to hand over abut $ 3 billion of American taxpayer's money every year would a good start and stop supplying any military equipment to Israel. When it comes to Iran, I can't believe that nobody says a word about the 200 or so Israeli illegal nuclear weapons, while Iran does not have any and probably never will! If it was not for the Israeli technician who squeeled about it years ago and who ended up in prison for years, the world would not even know about the Israeli weapons. I say, he is a hero!
YOU GOT IT !
The term 'Genocidal Monstrosity' comes to mind!
Humbaba: "The term 'Genocidal Monstrosity' comes to mind!"
Psychopaths have their own unique style of reasoning. If they want something, they will have it no matter what they have to do to get it. They have no conscience, no guilt, no shame, no empathy, no compassion. They act blatantly and deny that they have done anything wrong, and those who are their victims are blamed and they insist that the victims caused them to do what they did and deserve everything they got. They never feel embarrassed even if caught red-handed because they can't. So what?
These are soul-sucking, life-destroying vampires. And if you sit down at a table with them to solve a problem or change a situation, they may seem to interact normally, but a solution will never be agreed to if this is not what the psychopath has in mind or there may be an agreement, but the psychopath will violate or ignore the agreement almost immediately if it gets in the way of his/her own desires or plans.
People who are not psychopaths or have not had really close encounters with psychopaths do not understand what they are dealing with. These people sincerely discuss or negotiate in good faith from a very human level. They are dealing with a full deck of human qualities and mental processes. The psychopaths are missing half the deck. But the people who are not psychopaths get sucked in by the seeming ordinary statements and responses of the psychopaths, which can include feigned warmth and charm, but they do not understand that commitments and agreements are "busy work," and mean nothing to the psychopaths if they get in the way of their ambitions and desires.
It looks like a human; it talks and walks like a human, Humbaba, but it may very likely be a "Genocidal Monstrosity."
The words are not important. Always it's the actions that count.
Just the last ten years tell the tales for both the United States and Israel.
And with the final touches by the U.S. Military contractees to the largest BUNKER BUSTING BOMB that ever was put on fast forward, and Israel's leadership salivating for the destruction of Iran's in-ground nuclear facilities ... in December is the rumor, and just in time for Hannukah and Christmas, it's not lookin' good.
We are dealing with the kind of INSANITIES that do not lend themselves to endless sessions in Freudian or Jungian analysis or supportive group therapy or reasoned discussions at the toothless United Nations. We are dealing with "unflappable," "no conscience" "human" beings who are missing one hellava' lot of cards in their brain decks with no leavening from their "hearts." They will keep on doing exactly what they want to do with a lot of help from other psychopaths or misguided fanatics circled around them or clustered within major governmental bodies.
For the rest of us here in the U.S. with the increasingly ordinary problems of job loss, home loss, feeding our families, keeping up with bills, getting medical help when we need it, the future grows ever more precarious. And for those elsewhere in the world whose daily fare is to survive, if all hell busts loose, which well it might, well then we'll all be in the same boat.
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This all sounds so horribly depressing. It is.
But start reading up on what others are doing in their own neighborhoods on web sites and in fine magazines, such as YES. People are getting to know each other and exploring ways to help each other and be supportive.
My son-in-law, lost his job. He is 60 and his field is very specific. An incident happened down the road with another neighbor in his well-tended suburban neighborhood. It turned out when the neighbor came to apologize for blowing his stack, he revealed he had been out of work for five months. He thought he was the only one. Now at least he knew there was someone else in the same situation.
Anyway the whole thing became a lovely story, and from what happened may come a support group of the unemployed, and family-to-family discussions of "what if" and "what can we do together that will make life easier for all of us"? A tight, mutually supportive community is a good thing -- an old-fashioned idea whose time truly has come again.
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What a ride!
peace, cm
Bravo, CM, bravo!
Obama, who now has more stormtroopers engaged in warfare than Bush ever had, is worse than Bush because he fools more people.
The zionist/neocon cabal is one of the most evil cabals to ever exist.
But he gets a peace prize for it...ha ha! How pathetic!
OBOMBA WILL MAKE BUSH LOOK GUN SHY ! HE'S JUST GETTING STARTED
Bring America Back !!!!..............!!!..While Jimmy Carter's aspiration was to have a Govt as "great" as the
American people, his words are tempered by the guy who
said: ....You can fool all the people some of the time; some of the people all of the time; but, you cannot fool
all of the people all of the time."
**I realize that Susan Rice is to Obama what John Bolton was to King George, but Rice seems far too intelligent to even try to push Genocide at Gaza over as Israeli self defense !
**It reminds me of Colin Powell lying thru his teeth about
proof of WMDs in Iraq==at the UN Security Council; and Bolton mouthing the Neocon party line on how sister Zion just had to bomb innocent civilians in Lebanon.
**I just cannot visualize the beautiful, smart Susan Rice trying to defend the defenseless slaying of over 1400 Gazans,
300 to 400 which were innocent, helpless, defenseless children. How does she defend the blockades of medicine, food, water and nurturing caregivers by Zion ?
**On the other hand, if she lies thru her Obama teeth at the UN Security Council--it may be only practice for the eventual incursion into Iran==and convincing we Sheeples that Iran just can't have nuclear power.
**We need very much to cast the reminder that Prez Obama did, in fact , utter and is on videotape, with at least one innocuous comment on Gaza:=====in concept he states...'if my daughters were in the line of fire of missiles, I would be compelled to do the same thing as the Israelis....'!
**And there is evidence that the US Army Corps of Engineers built a mock-Gaza city for Israel on its turf, and coached and practiced with the IDF the best ways to attack the defenseless city of Gaza !! That's more blame to share!!
**Since there is no question and answer format at the UN, I guess Susan Rice can't be called up on Obama's words or the Corps' war training. It will be fascinating watching her pretend that little sister Zion does not call all the shots of the US Mideast foreign policy.
December 10, 2009 - Day Obama will be accepting the Nobel Peace prize in Oslo.
Obama just keeps providing more reasons for not deserving the award. By Dec 10, more outrage will be built up against his receiving the award. It will be interesting to see the clash between MSM fawning over Obama receiving his award and those opposed to him receiving the award.
By Dec 10, if Israel hasn't struck Israel, or Lebanon again, I expect it will do so shortly afterwards. It probably won't do so on the eve of the award, but who knows, they may do so in order to snub Obama, just like the snubbing of Obama with its refusal to stop settlement building (ethnic cleansing).
"That President Obama is receiving the Noble Peace prize after his failure to speak out during the Gaza war, and after his administration's protection of a state that has committed war crimes, is an abomination," Michael Ratner, president of the New York-based Centre for Constitutional Rights.
Thanks for the heads up on December 10. Hopefully the Peace Committee's bizarre action will bring some depth to the conversation of the actuality of US foreign policy.
Re Progressive101 October 15th, 2009 12:00 pm
You write in part "By Dec 10, if Israel hasn't struck Israel..."
I'm sure you meant to write "Iran," but your slip should serve to remind us that false-flag acts of terrorism are an ever-present threat.
Thanks, yes I meant to write "Iran".
Yesterday Paul Woodward’s, “War in Context” reminded us of Israel’s Barbarism and bare faced, lies, venom, and the plain arrogant righteousness expressed by their president as well the patience tolerance and eventual noble action of ignoring a sham by the Prime Minister of Turkey during a debate “Gaza: the case for Middle East peace,” at Davos earlier this year (Moderated by the congenital MSM ignoramus David Ignatius).
It makes one think especially in the light of these documented charges about what kind of people lead Israel and how; perhaps by believing their own lies they can perpetuate the myths hate that keeps them in power, prevents their own people from ripping each other apart over their own differences and further prevents them from looking into a mirror.
(For readers who want to fast forward to the part where Shimon Peres starts venting his rage, drag the play marker across to 45 minutes 50 seconds.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cR4zRbPy2kY&feature=player_embedded
Lucitanian:
I haven't watched your link yet but here's one which almost made me puke. The self-righteousness and audacity of these people is mind-boggling!
------------
Netanyahu: No war crimes trials for Israelis
JERUSALEM – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday vowed never to allow Israeli leaders or soldiers to stand trial on war crimes charges over their actions during last winter's military offensive in the Gaza Strip, furiously denouncing a U.N. report in a keynote address to parliament.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091012/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_palestinians
Why not? Obama is protecting Bush and Cheney for THEIR war crimes.
That would be like Hitler acting for the proscecution at Neuremburg
"He also said that Hamas "is a terrorist organisation and has neither the ability nor the willingness to examine its violations of human rights".
HAMAS are also the elected leaders of Palistine.
"The only means of strengthening one's intellect is to make up one's mind about nothing, to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts." - John Keats
Obama and his Bush/Cheney continued regime action are under the impression that, if you protect some war criminals you must protect them all. Isreal has been a thorn in the side of that region for years and will continue to do so as long as the U.S. is their pupet.
Of course USSA Israeli brown tongued policies of OBOMBA/BUSHLIM/CLINTONISTA clique are low down and dirty but why can't the Arab nations stand up and join in,in defence of Palestinians? Why are they so brown tongued too?
Judge Goldstone had the advantage of independence, honesty and truth. Why did we question the silence of most Germans during Hitler"s atrocities? Why are we covering up at the UN?
Speaking of Israel:
242 House Democrats voted yesterday to strengthen sanctions on Iran. Only 3 had the courage to vote "Nay". Kucinich was one.
http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2009/roll776.xml
Democrats apparently think they can do whatever they want because left leaning Americans will always vote for them instead of voting independent.
After all the CIA and various US administrations have inflicted on the world, no American ambassador should be calling Hamas or any other organization "terrorists". When you live in a glass house you are very foolish to throw stones!
In 1947-48, my father made a statement that infuriated his friends.
He stated that the US in the future would regret having insisted on the Nuremburg trials and signing the accords. He stated that if the allies had lost, they would have been the defendants since we had committed such heinous acts as the intentional bombing of civilian populations - Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Tokyo, Dresden, Munich and other Axis cites not withstanding many Allied soldiers refusing to take any prisoners, choosing to kill surrenderees anyway.
Turns out he was right. Us white Christians and our allies can do no wrong - even when the acts are in plain sight of the rest of the world. The problem is that our dumbed down society does not understand the ramifications of our hypocrisy.
Somewhere, my father is saying "I told you so."
""That President Obama is receiving the Noble Peace prize after his failure to speak out during the Gaza war, and after his administration's protection of a state that has committed war crimes, is an abomination," Michael Ratner, president of the New York-based Centre for Constitutional Rights, told IPS."
One need go no further than the above statement to see Barak Obama for what he is. A morally deficient man such as this can only lead America down the wrong path. Despite his rhetoric Barack is about Barack and little else.
peacekeepertwo: If the US allows an Investigation of war Crimes by Isreal, next the world will want to Investigate War crimes commited by US soldiers. We must protect the good name of the US, at all cost.
[ We must protect the good name of the US, at all cost.]
What good name???
"Ambassador Maged Abdelaziz of Egypt urged the powerful 15-member political body to "seriously consider and act upon the recommendations" of the U.N. Fact Finding Mission headed by Justice Richard Goldston."
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Oooooh, I bet that Obama wet his pansies when he heard such an urgent message - from non-other than US/Israel puppet Egypt. P U L E E E E A S E! And the Egyptians of all people should talk. Perhaps somebody at the UN Council meeting should have reminded this dude that it was his own country that sealed the borders during the Gaza massacre in order to prevent those poor people from escaping the bloodshed and trapping them like rats for Israel to mass murder them. Egypt aided and abetted Israel in the bloodshed and should also be tried for crimes against humanity along with the murderous Israelis. But why should they care as long as they get gazillions of dollars from the US? What's 1400 dead bodies their brothers and sisters if that guarantee that US aid will continue to flow thru their pockets?
The debate is goin on now inside the Knesset where Livi is attacking Bibi for not acknowledging the report.
It would be a great way to peace because the justice being called for in the report is the violent root of the problem.
just as releasing the new prisoner abuse photos with the president apologizing for American imperialism in the world and calling for a series of local and world meetings of leaders and activists of all points of view to declare what they need and the world needs for more cooperation, peace and happiness.... Whew..that would be a way too!
He should have special units to offer truce and willingness to help the enemy if they well let us know what they need to not kill us... this is the only way to rationally deal with our stupid Dilemma
because It is gonna be more than just "go Home!".
I think America is realizing that the way to insure the future is to come home.
Shalom
Re: US: Slow learner or unscrupulous financer of Jewish terrorism?
The 'bitch slapping' the US received at WTC on 9-11 from 'O Sammy bin-Laden for the financing of Jewish terorism seems to have escaped the American people.
Let us pray that the Jewish Gaza massacres don't bring the great Satan to its knees in Afghanistan and Pakistan where the seething anger of the Islamic people means 'bad shit' for the US/NATO killers of innocents who's flag drapped coffins have brought on a 3rd shift at Dover AFB and sadness at the Heathrow airport in London where the British 'welcome home' their dead 'crusaders.'
TheAZCowBoy
Tombstone, AZ.
'Kill 'em all Taliban patriots who defend their people from the US/NATO genocidal killers of innocents, Let their God sort them out.'