According to the JTA, when it comes to rescinding the Goldstone Report--the ball is now in Goldstone's court:
Richard Goldstone would have to ask the United Nations on behalf of his committee to rescind its report on Israel's actions during the 2009 Gaza war to set such an action in motion, a U.N. spokesman said.Even assuming that Goldstone is not finished, and will take the next logical step in rescinding the Goldstone Report, it is still too early to know for sure how the UN would respond to such a request.
The U.N. Human Rights Council, which commissioned the report, has not received such a request, The Associated Press reported Monday.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and a host of other Israeli officials and organizations have called on the United Nations to cancel the Goldstone Report after the former South African judge wrote in an Op-Ed Saturday in The Washington Post that Israel did not intentionally target civilians as a policy during the Gaza War, withdrawing a critical allegation in the Goldstone Report released in September 2009. [emphasis added]
However, there is one person whose response to such a request has already been made clear--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?
Hat tip: Alana Goodman
Technorati Tag: Goldstone Report.
3 comments:
Nope. The Goldstone report was adopted to condemn Israel.
The truthfulness of that condemnation was never really at issue.
And if you're expecting it to be rescinded Daled, you as might as well wait until the arrival of Godot.
The difference between "Waiting for Godot" and our situation is that Godot was subtitled "a tragicomedy in two acts"
We are way past that point.
The reason Israel didn’t cooperate with Goldstone in the first place was the fact that unlike other judges he agreed to head a committee whose actual mandate was to blame Israel for war crimes. This man has caused unprecedented damage to the State of Israel. Thousands of Israeli soldiers and officers are subject to legal proceedings around the globe thanks to him. His article of regret has no legal bearing which could prevent these proceedings from going on further.
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