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(Haaretz) – Israel asked a number of senior members of the Obama administration to assist in curbing the international fallout from the Goldstone Commission report, which accuses Israel of committing war crimes in Gaza during Operation Cast Lead.
The Foreign Ministry decided to focus their efforts to combat the report’s accusations on the United States, Russia and a few other members of the United Nations Security Council and the Human Rights Council that are involved in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Israeli message is that the Goldstone report threatens those countries because it makes the war on terror very difficult, and therefore efforts must be made to prevent it from being brought before the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu raised the issue with U.S. special Middle East envoy George Mitchell, while Deputy Foreign Minister Daniel Ayalon discussed it with U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice and other senior officials.
The international commission appointed by the UN Human Rights Council and headed by Judge Richard Goldstone accuses Israel of war crimes, and is passing on its recommendations to the ICC in The Hague.
The Foreign Ministry has established a forum of legal experts to follow any lawsuits that could be filed as a result of the report and to prepare for a scenario in which a suit would be brought forward in The Hague.
Ayalon, who is on a working visit to the United States, began to transmit messages to senior members of the U.S. administration and Congress on the need to object to the report. He noted that the same approach that was taken to United Nations General Assembly Resolution 3379 equating Zionism with racism needs to be taken regarding the Goldstone report.
President Shimon Peres released a statement saying that the Goldstone report “made a mockery of history.”
The Prime Minister’s Office decided that Peres would take the front lines in Israel’s campaign against the report. Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman would not express themselves publicly on the matter, but would engage in quiet diplomacy.
A United Kingdom court deferred until further notice an appeal by local pro-Palestinian groups to issue an arrest warrant against visiting Defense Minister Ehud Barak.
It is not yet clear whether the issue will be raised for deliberation while Israel’s top defense official is still in Britain.
According to sources close to Barak, the British Foreign Ministry recommended to the London court that it treat the current appeal in the same manner it did when a similar appeal was issued in 2004 against Israel’s then defense minister, Shaul Mofaz.
At the time, Mofaz was granted immunity from international arrest and trial – a precedent set by the British court, which until then had given such protection only to foreign ministers or premiers.
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(Jerusalem Post) – The security cabinet approved the release of 20 female Palestinian prisoners and detainees in exchange for an up-to-date video tape of kidnapped IDF soldier Gilad Schalit.
The decision to release the Palestinians came upon the recommendation of the team working for Schalit’s release, headed by Hagai Hadas.
A statement issued by the Prime Minister’s Office said the cabinet decided to respond positively to this initiative as a “confidence building measure within the framework of the indirect negotiations” with Hamas over Schalit.
Once the names of the Palestinians are on the internet, the public – as was the case in similar prisoner releases in the past – will have 48 hours to appeal. After that period, the prisoners will be released once the German mediator – Ernst Urlau – hands the tape over to Israel.
Urlau has already seen the video, which is believed to have been taped within the last few weeks.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."Shamefully, the Obama administration’s policy is to praise Goldstone while criticizing the report, which if anything could be stronger.
And in general the frustrating thing is that the crime committed against Gaza is far from Israel’s first such atrocity, so why did it take so long for people to finally be outraged enough to actually sit up and take notice? Why wasn’t Lebanon, 2006 enough, and why weren’t the countless massive attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure in the OPT in the earlier part of this century enough? Even if you buy the nonsense that 1967 was a defensive war, why were the crimes and massive ethnic cleansing campaigns in Jerusalem, the West Bank, Gaza, and the Golan Heights (96% of the Syrian population systematically – and selectively – ethnically cleansed) enough? And for that matter why were the crimes of 1948, including the systematic ethnic cleansing of all but 150,000 or so Palestinians, enough to indicate the nature and goals of the Zionist enterprise in Palestine? Is it because the Zionists were white Europeans, and Israel is a Western state plunked into the “Oriental” Middle East that people have excused six-plus decades of crimes that would have generated enormous outrage and decisive action if committed by any “brown” country? I’m just asking.
sigh..
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(Haaretz) – Israel should consider ousting Norwegian monitors from Hebron due to Oslo’s “hostility” toward Israel, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman told the cabinet.
… Tension between Jerusalem and Oslo increased recently after Norway’s government pension fund decided to divest from an Israeli company, Elbit.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."