The prime minister said during the meeting that the establishment of an investigation committee was “not an option.”

“IDF soldiers and officers will not be subjected to investigation,” he stressed.

An official at the prime minister’s office said that there were “differing opinions on what should be done.”

Barak added that “we sent the fighters on the mission, and they deserve our full support.”

“Israel is prepared to fight against the legitimacy of the Goldstone report. In addition, Israel will act to amend rules of war to adjust them to the battle against terrorists who fight from among civilians,” he said.

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

10:30PM: Solomon has more on the Silverstein panel incident. As he notes:

This is interesting for what it says about the “progressive” mind-set. Also note that while J Street doesn’t want an official affiliation with this panel, they were not above giving them space and using their own paid staff as enforcers.

9:10PM: Here’s the video of Richard Silverstein having a blogger kicked out letting a blogger know he was about to be booted out of his panel discussion (held in a room at the same hotel as the official J-Street conference).

I am told the blogger wasn’t doing anything wrong – just filming – and was a paid attendee. Someone from JStreet ended up apologizing.

8:58PM: You can watch the “pro-Israel” (read: not so much) J-Street conference live here.

Meanwhile, I have it on good authority that anti-Israel blogger Richard Silverstein had a blogger kicked out of his J-Street Blogger panel. My contact has promised me video of Silverstein having the blogger ejected, and I’ll post it then.

8:25PM: A new ADL poll shows that Americans are more sympathetic towards Israel than the palestinians, and support an Israeli strike on Iran.

Here are some of the highlights (you can click on any of the graphs to enlarge).

5:20PM: Meet the palestinian Sesame Street, where youngsters supposedly learn about non-violence and tolerance.

Or so we are led to believe. From 1:00 onwards, the tone takes a somewhat darker turn.

Call me crazy, but that pissed off bear bears an uncanny resemblance to Nassur.

5:02PM: The Syrians are trying to stir up trouble.

The Syrian Foreign Ministry has denounced Israel’s “blatant violation of the sanctity of al-Aqsa Mosque,” following the recent wave of riots in Jerusalem.

In an official statement released Monday, the ministry said that “(Damascus) believes the Israeli security forces’ invasion of al-Aqsa was part of Israel’s scheme to Judaize Jerusalem and destroy the mosque.”

A Syrian news agency further quoted the official as saying Israel’s actions were “a crime against Arab history and heritage and against Muslims’ holy places.”

I’m not quite sure how allowing the Muslims – through the Waqf – to retain control over the Temple Mount, and never attempting to destroy the mosque, in the 40 plus years since we captured the old city of Jerusalem, quite fits in to this scheme.

1:34PM: Today’s caption bias comes to us courtesy of Reuters.

A tourist takes a photograph of the Dome of the Rock on the compound known to Jews as the Temple Mount and to Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif (Noble Sanctuary) in Jerusalem’s Old City October 26, 2009. Israeli police stormed the compound on Sunday, hurling stun grenades at Palestinians who threw rocks at them, in another outbreak of violence at the holy city’s most sensitive site. REUTERS/Darren Whiteside (JERUSALEM POLITICS RELIGION TRAVEL)

The caption makes it sound like Israeli police aggressively raided the Temple Mount, which was met by the palestinian response of throwing rocks.  There is no mention of the fact the whole reason for the Israeli police doing what they did was as a response to Muslims preparing to cause trouble, nor the fact they did not just throw rocks, but also deadlier petrol bombs.

9:34AM: Turkey continues to attack Israel, with Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan now claiming that Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman threatened to use nuclear weapons against Gaza.

This doesn’t even dignify a response, given Israel’s proximity to Gaza and the fact Israelis would not agree to such action. But perhaps the Turks can include such a plot line in their favorite television show.

Meanwhile, Erdogan is calling someone who actually does intend to use nuclear weapons a “friend.”

The Turkish leader also stressed that Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has repeatedly called for Israel’s destruction, was a “friend” of Turkey’s.

“There is no doubt he is our friend,” Erdogan was quoted as saying. “As a friend so far we have very good relations and have had no difficulty at all.

6:00AM: Saeb Erekat, PLO Chief negotiator and master of propaganda, is up to his old tricks, accusing Israel of incitement and not being a partner for peace.

Dr Saeb Erekat, the PLO’s chief negotiator, on Sunday called on the US and Europe to demand that Israel end incitement against worshipers in occupied East Jerusalem.

“The international community must intervene and demand an end to Israeli incitement,” Erekat said in a statement. “Otherwise we fear that violence may spiral out of control.”

At least 30 Palestinians were injured and some 20 were arrested following the arrival of Israeli forces at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem’s Old City on Sunday morning. Nine Israeli police officers were also hurt in the clashes, which sparked amid announcements from right-wing Jewish groups and individuals, including Israeli parliament members, vowing to “ascend” the compound area under armed guard.

“This latest assault on the Al-Aqsa compound is part of a systematic and deliberate policy of incitement,” Erekat continued, condemning what he termed Israel’s latest violence against Palestinian worshippers in the holy city. “By escalating tensions to the point of violence, the Israeli government is looking for an escape clause to avoid meaningful negotiations.”

The PLO official urged Israel not to let extremists set the agenda.

“These are not the actions of a partner for peace, but a coalition of political forces in Israel that have consistently opposed peace between Palestinians and Israelis,” he said. “Israel is intensifying the violence of its occupation against ordinary Palestinians while it relentlessly pursues its colonization of occupied East Jerusalem and the rest of the West Bank.”

In the coming days, President Mahmoud Abbas will be meeting with King Mohammed VI of Morocco, who chairs the Organization of the Islamic Conference’s Al-Quds (Jerusalem) committee, Erekat announced. Abbas is expected to call on members of the committee to take decisive action to demand that Israel halt all settlement construction and other provocative policies in East Jerusalem.

Given that US President Barack Obama has called for the palestinians to end incitement against Israel, and Israel has repeatedly lamented the absence of a partner of peace on the palestinian side, I would fathom to say his choice of words is no coincidence. He is deliberately using those words commonly applied to the palestinians, in the tried and tested palestinian propaganda method of “turnspeak.”

5:48AM: Some scenes from yesterday’s Arab riots on the Temple Mount.

As you can see, they have a huge deal of respect for this holiest of sites.

Meanwhile, here in Israel, the cabinet had a heated discussion on whether Israel will set up a commission of inquiry on the Goldstone report’s allegations of war crimes, with Defense Minister Ehud Barak – who opposes such a commission – angered by PM Netanyahu’s comments to the Washington Times on the possibility of setting up a commission of inquiry “not because of the Goldstone report but because of our own internal needs.”

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

11:00PM: Fascinating BBC documentary on Entebbe, as part of the Age of Terror series.

Yes, I did say BBC.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Those were the days we didn’t negotiate with terrorists.

8:15PM: Richard Goldstone speaking with PBS’ Bill Moyers.

Fellow Understanding the Goldstone Report contributor Avi Bell, Professor of Law at Bar Ilan University and at University of San Diego Law School, has already done the hard work of watching the entire interview and analyzing Goldstone’s responses. Here’s what he had to say:

1. The Goldstone report draws its conclusions on the basis of 36 incidents it says it investigated. The report says that incidents are illustrative and therefore justify the broader conclusions made by the report. But Goldstone admits that the report lied in saying that the incidents are “illustrative” and in saying that the Mission worked according to its self-described neutral mandate rather than the official biased one. Goldstone says “We chose those 36 because they seemed to be, to represent the most serious, the highest death toll, the highest injury toll. And they appear to represent situations where there was little or no military justification for what happened.” In other words, the Mission chose incidents that were seen as NOT ILLUSTRATIVE, and, rather, most likely to support a finding of war crimes.
2. Goldstone repeatedly misstates the law in the interview.a) Goldstone implicitly misstates the rule of distinction. Goldstone rightly says that the rule of distinction requires combatants to distinguish between “combatants and innocent civilians.” But then, he “proves” that Israel violated the rule of distinction by saying “We found evidence in statements made by present and former political and military leaders, who said, quite openly, that there’s going to be a disproportionate attack. They said that if rockets are going to continue, we’re going to hit back disproportionately.” Stating that a counter-attack will be disproportionate to the attack isn’t a violation of the rule of distinction. The rule of distinction requires that Israel not aim its fire at civilians as such. It has nothing to do with how much fire Israel can aim at legitimate targets.b) Regarding the rules of distinction and proportionality, Moyers asks Goldstone, “Who is to say that? Who is to make that distinction?” Goldstone answers, “Well, that distinction must be made after the event.” That is absolutely, positively, not the law. The law is that commanders must make judgments on the basis of knowledge they have at the time, not that one second-guesses them after the event and judges them guilty on the basis of knowledge they may not have had. Thus, for example, Newton testified “In order to properly assess a real proportionality assessment therefore, the relevant question is what did the commander know? What information was available to him?”This is not an isolated misstatement by Goldstone. Throughout the interview, he keeps giving examples of judging after the fact. For example, he says: “We spoke to the owner of a home in Gaza City. He said he looked out of his window and he saw some militants, whether Hamas or other Palestinian groups, setting up their mortar launchers in his yard. He ran out and said, “Get out of here. I don’t want you doing this here. You’re going to endanger my family, because they going to bomb. Get out.” And in fact, they left. Whether that was typical or atypical, I don’t know, we didn’t, obviously, cover the field. But assuming they had disobeyed them, assuming they had launched the rockets from over the objections of the household owner, and his family, they launched the rockets and disappeared. It would be a war crime, as I understand it, for Israel to have bombed the home of that innocent household, who didn’t want this to happen.” Goldstone again, is wrong. Even if the facts were as Goldstone stated them, and the owner was absolutely innocent, the launching point of rockets would still be a legitimate target, and it would be permissible to attack it if the collateral damage were proportionate to anticipated military advantage, notwithstanding the damage to an innocent owner.Here’s another example. Moyer prompts “so there was intention,” meaning Israel deliberately violated the rule of distinction. Goldstone responds: “Well, certainly. You know, one thing one can’t say about the Israel Defense Forces is that they make too many mistakes. They’re very, a sophisticated army. And if they attack a mosque or attack a factory, and over 200 factories were bombed, there’s just no basis to ascribe that to error. That must be intentional.” Goldstone again is arguing that he can determine whether there was a crime by looking after the fact at what was destroyed, without any evidence of what the commander thought was the military advantage in attacking the site and what the commander thought would be the collateral damage. In Goldstone’s favor, here he at least tries to provide an excuse for his misstatement of the law: his preposterous assumption of Israeli omniscience.

   c) Goldstone falsely states that the only legal way to fight in an urban area is with commando actions. Moyer asks him: “But when the terrorists, the militants, whatever one wants to call them, are known to be embedded in, as you say, those tight, complex, concentrated areas, what’s the other army to do?” Goldstone says: “It’s for example, to launch commando actions, to get at the militants and not the innocent civilians.” This is clearly not in line with the practice of any other state in the world.

3. Goldstone says that NATO fighting in Yugoslavia was basically legal (Goldstone’s comment: “Take the United States fighting wars in Kosovo and Iraq and Afghanistan. They have certainly at a high level, gone to extremes to protect innocent civilians. Where they’ve made mistakes, and mistakes have been made, in Kosovo, in Iraq, in Afghanistan, apologies have followed. The United States, in general, has accepted and tried its best, with the assistance of military lawyers, has tried its best to avoid violating international humanitarian law.”). But Israel’s government specifically said, and the report noted that “The Israeli Government states that this expression of its objectives is no broader than those expressed by NATO in 1998 during its campaign in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia” (paragraph 1201). And the report responded by intimating that Israel’s objectives were therefore illegal (paragraph 1202 – “The Mission makes no comment on the legality or otherwise of NATO actions there”), before then saying explicitly that Israel’s objectives were illegal.
4. It’s interesting to see what Goldstone calls a good investigation. He dismisses the more than 100 Israeli investigations now ongoing because, he says, “it’s now, what, seven months since the end of the war. There’s only been one successful prosecution against a soldier, who stole a credit card, which is really almost fodder for cartoonists, in the plethora of alleged war crimes.” In other words, Israeli investigations will only be credible if they find Israelis guilty. The other reason he advances for attacking the Israeli investigations is “in those military investigations, as far as I’ve read, in only one cases have the military even approached the victims in Gaza. And obviously, to have a full investigation, one needs, as you say, to hear both sides.” This is rich, considering that Goldstone never spoke to any of the persons he accuses of committing crimes. Goldstone adds that Israeli investigations shouldn’t be trusted because they are done in “…secrecy? And, you know, I always quote Justice Brandeis, who said, “The best disinfectant is sunlight.” And this is happening in the dark. And even with the best good faith in the world on the part of the military investigators, the victims are not going to accept decisions that are taken in the dark, and don’t involve them.” But Goldstone is still refusing to refuse the evidence (written submissions, etc.) on the basis of which the report was written.
5. Goldstone states of Israel, “It’s got a wonderful legal system, its got a great judicial system, its got retired judges who certainly, in my book, would earn the respect of the overwhelming number of people around the world, including the Arab world, who, if they held open, good faith inquiries, would put an end to this.” It’s worth reciting this in relation to Goldstone’s claims of the inadequacy of Israeli investigations. As paragraph 1803 of the report admits, the Israeli investigatory system ends at the High Court of Justice. Anyone who is disappointed with a decision not to investigate an incident or bring charges against an individual, or failure of a military court to convict may appeal to the High Court of Justice. This includes non-citizens, like alleged Palestinian victims, and interested observers like Goldstone himself. And the High Court of Justice has no standing requirement, so anyone may bring suit, even if they are not directly harmed. If Goldstone really cares to have new investigations, and has any real evidence to show that crimes were committed aside from the conclusory statements in the report, why doesn’t he file a petition with the Israeli High Court of Justice? Why doesn’t he suggest it to any of the alleged Palestinian victims? Is he afraid to put his alleged evidence to the test of a court?

7:35PM: Now this is rich.

Justice Richard Goldstone has turned down an invitation by the Israeli Press Council to speak at a journalism conference in Eilat, slated to be held in November, according to a statement issued on the council’s Web site on Sunday.

Goldstone, who headed the UN fact-finding mission charged with investigating Hamas and IDF actions during Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip, has accused Israel of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity during the campaign, sparking widespread controversy in Israel.

In response to the invitation, Goldstone wrote in a letter to Press Council Director-General Eric Bahar that he would not be able to attend the conference, due to a prior speaking engagement at New York’s Fordham University law school, according to the statement.

In the letter, Goldstone also expressed his disappointment with the Israeli reaction to his commission’s report, likening it to bullying and stressing that he had urged the government to cooperate with his investigation.

7:26PM: A 21-year-old palestinian woman has stabbed a security guard at the Qalandiya checkpoint in northern Jerusalem.

A security guard stationed at the Qalandiya checkpoint in northern Jerusalem sustained light to moderate injuries Sunday afternoon after being stabbed by a Palestinian woman in the abdomen.

The assailant was apprehended. The guard was treated at the scene by Magen David Adom emergency services personnel and later evacuated to Jerusalem’s Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital.

“The guard was lying on the ground with a stab wound to his lower abdomen, and the young female terrorist was apprehended,” one of the paramedics said, “The guard was in great pain; he was in a state of shock.”

According to Magen David Adom, the stab wound was five centimeters deep (about two inches).

Guards manning the checkpoint spotted the knife in the woman’s handbag as she passed through the metal detector. She stabbed one of the guards who approached her with a knife she pulled out from under her skirt.

But the checkpoints are the problem, right?

4:35PM: Alan Howe of the Herald Sun has written this excellent op-ed on the Goldstone Report.

They say that you should set a thief to catch a thief.

The none-too-smart and ideologically unsound United Nations works on more simplistic levels – it sets angry Arabs to catch its Jews.

Works every time.

There’s no shortage of angry, resentful and underachieving Arabs at the UN, nor will it run out of like-minded Africans too soon.

By and large, Arabs and Africans are not good at democracy. They don’t do personal freedoms all that well. Many of them are fond of cruel and unusual punishments – you know, public stonings for miscreant young women wanting to marry the man of their choosing, that sort of thing.

That the UN powerlessly condemns such behaviour is, apparently, beside the point.

In a sneering perversion of logic, some Arab and African nations, to whom human rights are an unnecessary indulgence, sit at some of the UN’s top tables – the UN Human Rights Council and even the Committee Against Torture.

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Sharing leg space under the UN’s influential desks are such legendary stalwarts of democratic fairness and equality as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Burkina Faso, Egypt, Cameroon, Madagascar, Jordan, Nigeria, Senegal and China. Tin pots, basket cases, thugs – take your pick.

They were just some of the countries that, as members of the Human Rights Council, initiated and sat on an inquiry into the Israeli actions in Gaza, which took place almost a year ago.

Led by esteemed South African jurist Richard Goldstone, they lived up to cheeky Oscar Wilde’s putdown of Britain’s then greatest poet, William Wordsworth. Wilde said of Wordsworth’s famous bucolic lessons that “he found in stones lessons he had already put there”.

The UN Human Rights Council had its finding sewn up in January when it sent “an independent … fact-finding mission” to the “occupied Gaza Strip”.

O CCUPIED by whom? The Israelis walked away from Gaza four years ago, courageously dismantling the settlements there and controversially forcing its grumpy civilians to leave.

The only Israeli in Gaza that I can think of is the kidnapped soldier, Gilad Shalit, who has been held by Hamas terrorists for more than three years. Now there’s someone Goldstone might have spoken to.

Gazans paid Israelis back in spades for the long-sought opportunity to be masters of their own fate: they sent thousands of Qasam rockets over the border and on to local towns, the deadly fusillade becoming a political imperative in democratic Israel.

Israelis wanted their Government to stop the shelling and end the terror. That’s why the Israeli army entered Gaza last December in a controversial invasion in which about 1400 people were killed, mostly Palestinians. That’s the thing when you take on the Israelis; they don’t come at you with some wobbly rockets that Uncle Ali knocked up out the back last night.

And if you are going to employ the terrorist tactics of hiding and operating in densely populated areas and schools, expect some painful collateral damage.

The UNHRC didn’t appear to be on a hunt for the truth – that often being unbearable – but they are keen to reinforce the prejudices of each other by condemning Israel. Its predecessor, the UN Human Rights Commission, did the same until, thoroughly discredited, it embarrassed even Secretary-General Kofi Annan and he shut it down.

So with a slight change of name – the acronym stays the same, saves on stationery – it’s back to the same unquenchable hatred for Israel.

Goldstone’s report predictably accused Israel of human rights abuses in Gaza – so self-defence is now a crime?

A RESOLUTION endorsing the report’s finding went further, upsetting its author. It contained “not a single phrase condemning Hamas as we have done in the report”, said Goldstone, sounding almost surprised.

So which fearless, peace-loving and virtuous states signed on?

Senegal, for a start. Kids are big business in Senegal, but not the Toys ‘R’ Us kind. There they are sold into forced labor, prostituted and often trafficked to other countries to become domestic servants – the illegal variety that has almost no identity and whom you can imprison and rape with impunity.

This year Senegal arrested nine HIV-prevention workers, reportedly beat them, accused them of consorting with criminals (being in police custody in Dakar, I guess they were), charged them with “indecent and unnatural acts” and jailed them.

Senegal – and I wish this were a joke – is also a key player on the UN’s Committee Against Torture.

Egypt also saw merit in the loony resolution. Now here’s a country that keeps the Committee Against Torture busy. The committee has expressed concern at the “persistence of the phenomenon of torture and ill-treatment of detainees by law enforcement officials”.

In 2002, the very committee on which now Egypt sits found it guilty of a pattern of “torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment”.

Nigeria voted yes. I’m voting Nigeria’s one of the nastiest governments on earth. Prisoners of its corrupt judicial system are raped and tortured. The lucky ones.

In Nigeria’s northern states, lashings and stonings are popular and, if you see an amputee in the streets, it is unlikely that he is a member of the Limbless Soldiers’ Association. Of course, there are restrictions on freedoms of speech, movement, assembly, religion and the press.

Djibouti voted yes, but I wonder what the genitally mutilated, repressed women of that Horn of Africa hellhole really think?

Cameroon voted yes, and if you are up for a few entertaining minutes just look at official travel advisory for it.

While you are there you might check advisories for Zambia, Pakistan, Ghana, the Philippines, Russia, Richard Goldstone’s homeland South Africa, Qatar, Mauritius and all the others who sit in judgment on a world gone mad.

1:48PM: Ynet’s Yair Lapid writes about his upcoming interview with Swedish “journalist” Donald Bostrom – of organ harvesting blood libel fame.

I’m supposed to interview Donald Bostrom at the upcoming Dimona media convention. But maybe I’m supposed to take the stage and punch him in the face?

Bostrom is the Swedish journalist who published the infamous article accusing IDF troops of harvesting organs from Palestinian bodies. We are dealing, of course, with a blood libel of the worst kind. However, Bostrom, who never saw such body and was unable to bring any proof for his story aside from a bunch of wild Palestinian rumors, still argues that the matter must be probed.

The moment such story emerges, he says, the press’ job is to publish it. And now I’ve been tasked with the unpleasant duty of explaining to Bostrom that he doesn’t understand how the press works during war.

According to Bostrom, freedom of expression means that if someone lies, the journalist isn’t supposed to verify the truth – but rather, publish the lie in a “balanced manner” (that is, next to a weak denial that convinces nobody.) Journalists like Bostrom never lie; they merely report the truth about what they were told by liars.

The story published by Bostrom, if you try for a moment to cool off and read it objectively, stems from lack of understanding: Israel, by law, sends anyone hurt by IDF fire to a post-mortem examination. Absurdly, this is part of our attempt to seek the truth. When the Bostroms of the world call, we want to give them accurate answers: Who killed him? Under what circumstances? When?

However, the Palestinians saw the bodies with the stitching marks on them and didn’t get it. Why is there a need to perform a post-mortem? They asked themselves. He was hit by a bullet and died. So then they started to circulate wild rumors, and Hamas’ PR department sold the story to the global media, and Bostrom bought into it.

Because from Goldstone to Bostrom, the State of Israel gets slammed time and again in the same way: The Palestinians lie. They realized, much before we did, that the war takes place not only on the streets of Gaza, but also on millions of TV screens. In their view, if we are allowed to use phosphorous bombs, they are allowed to use lies. This is the classic weapon of the weak: Cheap, effective, risk-free, and let’s admit it: Painful.

So is Bostrom an anti-Semite? Of course he is. Does he know he’s an anti-Semite? That’s a different story. I tend to believe that if we connect him to a polygraph and ask him whether he hates Jews, the needles will not shake. He doesn’t hate us; he just thinks we’re different.

It’s hard to blame him. This notion, that we’re different, came from us after all. If for 2,000 years you dress up differently, believe in a different God, celebrate different holidays, and on top of it insist on telling everyone that you’re completely different than them, ultimately they’ll believe you.

The problem is that this is a double-edged sword. When we say we’re different, we in fact mean to say that we’re better. It’s very nice, but human nature doesn’t work that way.

People always tend to prefer people who are similar to them; and what’s worse, they are always willing to believe about others things they would believe about themselves. They are different, these Jews, and everything is possible with them. They may be so smart that thye figured out the mystery of the ribosome, and they may be so cold-hearted that they created a hedge fund and stole $50 billion, and they may be so cruel as to harvest organs. You can never know; after all you can’t know what goes through their mind.

And the most painful part is that they placed us in the same category with the liars.

12:48PM: In case you think the Arab rioters are throwing “mere rocks” (which can be lethal on their own)

Palestinians stand near a fire that started after Arab youths threw a petrol bomb during clashes with Israeli police in Jerusalem’s Old City October 25, 2009. Israeli police fired stun grenades at Arab youths who threw rocks at them (and petrol bombs, of course – ed.) in the compound of Jerusalem’s flashpoint al-Aqsa mosque in the Old City on Sunday, Israeli and Palestinian officials and witnesses said. REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun (JERUSALEM POLITICS CONFLICT)

No doubt if any of the palestinians get burned, they will:

• Blame Israel
• Get their medical treatment in Israel at the taxpayers’ expense

9:08AM: Arab rioters have planned a “spontaneous” welcome to the working week on the Temple Mount.

Security forces, who were already on high alert in Jerusalem on Sunday morning, didn’t have to wait long to be called into action, confronting Muslim rioters on the Temple Mount and arresting 12 people.

Police, who were accompanying a group of tourists up to the mount, had caught several Muslim youngsters on video camera preparing to cause trouble, including filling barrels of oil to pour onto the ground to hinder the access of security forces and the visitors.

Following the discovery, police reinforcements stormed the mount and were pelted with stones by the young rioters. The forces dispersed the riots using stun grenades, among other means at their disposal.

The source added that the decision appears to be based on pressure from the Obama administration, exerted by way of U.S. representatives in Geneva, as well as through contacts between Washington and Ramallah.

The Obama administration has told the Palestinians that a renewal of the peace process must come before any diplomatic initiatives based on the Goldstone report, or any other initiatives that could stifle efforts to renew Israel-PA negotiations.

If this is true, it would seem to indicate that the Obama administration agrees with Bibi that adoption of the Goldstone report would be a blow for the so-called peace process.

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

4:46PM: The family of abducted IDFsoldier Gilad Shalit has approved the broadcast of video footage of their son. So I am posting it here now.

With the Sabbath/Sukkot soon approaching, I do not have time to post a full translation. But here is what Ynet reported.

In the tape, Shalit says: “Hello, this is Gilad, son of Noam and Aviva Shalit, brother of Hadas and Yoel who live in Mitzpe Hila. My ID number is 97027.

As you can see I am holding today’s Falasteen newspaper published in Gaza

I read the newspaper in order to find information about myself, and in hopes of reading about information of my return home and my imminent release.”

Gilad then continues: “I hope the current government headed by Benjamin Netanyahu doesn’t waste this opportunity to reach an agreement and as a result, allow me to fulfill my dream and be released.”

The Israeli media report he sounds lucid and looks healthy. I am not so sure about the healthy part (he looks really pale and thin to me), but at least he is alive.

May he be released speedily. Preferably without Israel having to give up even one more terrorist, and with heavy terrorist casualties.

1:42PM: PM Netanyahu, Defense Minister Ehud Barak, and senior IDF officers have viewed the videotape of Gilad Shalit received in exchange for releasing female palestinian terrorists. According to reports, the videotape is over two minutes long, and shows Shalit to be lucid and in good health.

11:42AM: Israeli scientists have developed a more lethal version of our Zionist Death Pigs ^TM, which in addition to being able to distinguish between palestinians and Israelis, release deadly Swine Flu and break into houses, can now stuff their victims in to their own body parts.

Medical sources at the Jenin governmental Hospital reported that 75 year-old Khaled Mustapha Al-Kilany from Nazlah Zeid village near Ya’bod village southwest Jenin was taken to Hospital after being attacked by a wild pig Thursday.

Zeid’s relatives said he sustained bruises all over his body and may also suffer from internal bleeding after the pig attacked him in front of his home. The farmer in all his body parts after being attacked by the wild pig where he was standing in front of his house.

Meanwhile, palestinians have changed their “the pigs are deliberately released to attack us” narrative to a “it’s because of the separation fence” narrative. Which means you have to be Goldstone-gullible to believe them.

10:05AM: Today’s must-read: Retired major general Jim Molan, chief of operations of the Iraq multinational force in 2004-05, on the Goldstone Report (hat tip: Barry Rubin).

Richard Goldstone, a prominent South African jurist, claims in The New York Times that he hesitatingly accepted his UN mandate to investigate the three-week December-January war between Hamas and Israel because he was taking on something “deeply charged and politically loaded”. Many states considered this mandate one-sided. Prominent individuals offered the view that it was more about politics than human rights. Goldstone was wise to hesitate, but he took the mission that will forever bear his name.

The Goldstone report was the product of the Gaza fact-finding mission, which could never have been a judicial mission, given the inclusion of publicly biased members. Still, despite a lack of co-operation from key parties, notably Israel, Goldstone’s mission reached the conclusion that Israel was guilty of directing its military operations, at least in part, “at the people of Gaza as a whole”. The reaction has been to drive all parties even further into their corners and has contributed very little clarity to the big issues.

Goldstone claims he has a deep belief in the law of war and that civilians “should to the greatest extent possible be protected from harm”. He states that Israel “could have done more to spare civilians” who died from “disproportionate attacks”. The Israeli military, he claimed, repeatedly “failed to adequately distinguish between combatants and civilians, as the law strictly requires”. And he concludes that Israel should have refrained from attacking “clearly civilian buildings and from actions that might have resulted in a military advantage but at the cost of too many civilian lives”.

The way that Goldstone frames these statements in his article should lead us to question how he confidently reached a guilty verdict. The law of war is rightly full of the kind of restricting concepts mentioned above. A formal example is Article 51(5)(b) of Protocol I, which prohibits “an attack which may be expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated”.

Is this modified and reasonable statement the discrimination that the judge says “the law strictly requires”?

The just war principles emerged as society moved towards a less dark age, and include conflict that is morally justified. We can all have an opinion on how just the Israeli attack on Hamas was, but it remains an opinion shaped by our prejudices. Jurists of the just war era even differentiated between the commentator and the statesman, acknowledging that the statesman has an obligation to deal with threats to their citizens, not just talk about them. Goldstone is no statesman in this sense, he is the commentator.

The law of war is a body of rules regulating the conduct of states and combatants engaged in armed hostilities, drawing heavily from the Hague and Geneva conventions, as well as numerous agreements that limit the means and conduct of hostilities. This body of law often speaks in terms of attacker and defender.

When I was involved in military operations in the second year of the Iraq war, working with the US military, I found it useful to reduce the legal regime to several key concepts. Every offensive action I took had to be necessary for military reasons, not result in unnecessary suffering, was amenable to distinction between military and civil people and property, and did not cause destruction or suffering disproportionate to the expected military gain, even against legitimate military targets. I satisfied myself that I achieved these and I satisfied the system that scrutinised every action I took. I probably never will convince those who have on occasions publicly, ignorantly and incorrectly associated me with war crimes.

Our adversary in Iraq consistently ignored all humanitarian law as well as the laws of war, particularly the blatant abuse of medical facilities and places of worship. Our adversary’s major strategy was to blow the arms and legs off innocent women and children at times calculated to fit the need of the world’s media networks. This was an immorality of strategy that was breathtaking, exercised not just once or twice, but over years. Despite the nature of our enemy, we realised that our right to injure even our enemy was limited.

But the defender also has obligations. He cannot exploit these laws by deliberately commingling his fighters with civilians, as Hamas admits it did. This violates the most basic principle of the law of war. However, should our opponents do this, the attacker is not relieved of all legal obligations: we still had to comply with proportionality principles and refrain from attacks likely to result in civilian damage excessive in relation to military gain.

Let us not forget that it is very common for our adversaries, be they al-Qa’ida or Hamas, to exploit legal constraints for their strategic or tactical gain. Proportionality is always an issue, but to see Hamas as David to the Israeli Goliath, and to then feel undue empathy for David while blaming everything on Goliath, is to distort the complexity of each position. For example, I would argue that to comply with the law of war it is essential that if a combatant possesses the precision-guided munitions that the report seemed to see as unfair, he is obligated to use those because they discriminate.

Inherent in the principle of protecting the civilian population is a requirement that civilians not be used to render areas immune from military operations. A party to a conflict that chooses to use its civilian population for military purposes violates its obligation to protect its own civilians. It should not complain (but of course it will) when inevitably, although regrettable, civilian casualties result.

With experience of having to tread through this legal and moral minefield while acting as an agent of the statesman who has an obligation to act, I was looking forward to how Goldstone was going to react to questions such as: How much discrimination is enough? How much of the inevitable killing of innocents is too much? How do we equate our complex war aims with the use of military force against a terrorist organisation that flouts the rule of law? How do you assess in legal terms the proportionality of a war between a terrorist force and one of the world’s most advanced militaries? If one side uses backyard rockets is the other side not allowed to use precision-guided missiles? Do three Israelis killed and hundreds wounded by backyard rockets equal 1000 Gazans killed by Israeli actions? Given the legal regime recognises the difficulty of military decision-making amid the fog of war, and thus obligates planners and commanders to base decisions on information reasonably available at the time, how did the report handle this issue?

On these and many other questions, the Goldstone report is strangely silent, a luxury that I did not have in Iraq, and a luxury that the Israeli commanders probably did not have in Gaza.

The Goldstone report is an opinion by one group of people putting forward their judgments, with limited access to the facts, and reflecting their own prejudices. The difference in tone and attitude in the report when discussing Israeli and Hamas actions is surprising.

I probably do not need to state for most readers that as a soldier who has run a war against an opponent not dissimilar to Hamas, facing problems perhaps similar to those faced by Israeli commanders, my sympathies tend to lie with the Israelis. I can hold and openly declare those prejudices even while I acknowledge that within institutions that may be overall just and moral, there can be individuals or small groups who act outside the law. They must be dealt with, and in my war, they were.

But having stated my prejudice, I think I may be more honest than Goldstone, who seems to pass off his prejudices in a report that cannot be based on fact, and uses judicial language and credibility to do so. It comes down to equality of scepticism: if you refuse to believe anything the Israelis say, then you have no right to unquestioningly accept what Hamas says.

Goldstone is a former chief prosecutor for war-crime tribunals on Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia. Perhaps it is easier to come to a judicial decision with some integrity in such circumstances, than it is to examine the Israeli and Hamas roles in the last Gaza war. This kind of report, with all its biases, is one of the reasons why the US did not subject its military to the International Criminal Court. But Australia did.

As George Walden recently wrote in Britain’s The Times, “Morality minus practicality is pious grandstanding, something best left to pop stars and theatre folk.” And perhaps to the UN.

9:05AM: PA negotiator Saeb “Massacre” Erekat has denied reports the PA decided to withdraw its bid to adopt the Goldstone report on alleged war crimes in Gaza during Operation Cast Lead.

Given Erekat’s love-hate relationship with the truth (he loves to hate it), I take this as confirmation the PA has withdrawn its bid.

7:15AM: Today’s news of a possible Gilad Shalit release comes to us courtesy of the Jerusalem Post, in the wake of the 20-terrorists-for-Shalit-videotape exchange.

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How bad is the Goldstone Report? Israeli human rights group B’tselem – no strangers to criticizing Israel – has attacked some of the report’s key findings.

The UN Human Rights Council and the Goldstone Report are either biased or mistaken in some of their fundamental accusations against Israel, according to B’tselem human rights group director Jessica Montell.

She said the council was wrong in its gravest accusations against Israel. These include the claim that Israel intentionally targeted the civilian population rather than Hamas, and the “weak, hesitant way that the report mentions Hamas’s strategy of using civilians [in combat].”

But, she added, Israel could have avoided such a report had it conducted “a thorough investigation” of Cast Lead itself, something which B’tselem continues to urge on Israel’s leaders.

“Israel has only itself to blame” for its failure to investigate the accusations of abuses during January’s Operation Cast Lead that led to the report, according to Montell.

“There’s no question that the HRC, which mandated the Goldstone [fact-finding mission into the Gaza fighting], has an inappropriate, disproportionate fixation with Israel,” she said.

She added that the council was “a political body made up of diplomats, not human rights experts, which means that the powerful states are never going to come under scrutiny the way the powerless will. So China, Russia and the US will never have commissions of inquiry, regardless of how their crimes rank relative to Israeli crimes.”

As has the frequently critical of Israel The Economist.

Even the international magazine The Economist, which has stridently criticized Israeli actions in the West Bank and Gaza in the past, said the report’s conclusions were unfairly critical of Israel.

“The report takes the very thing it is investigating as its central organizing premise,” the magazine opined just days after the mid-September publication of the report.

“Israeli policy in Gaza, it argues, was deliberately and systematically to inflict suffering on civilians, rather than Hamas fighters. Israel’s assertions that, in the difficult circumstances of densely populated Gaza, it planned its military operations carefully and with constant legal advice are taken by the report as evidence not of a concern to uphold international law but of a culpable determination to flout it,” the magazine said.

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

10:58PM: Here is the statement by human rights scholar Anne Bayefsky on the Goldstone Report at the Human Rights Council yesterday (posted earlier, but removed after the video was made private).

8:34PM: The New York Knicks will be hosting Maccabi Tel Aviv in an exhibition game for the second time in three years. Proceeds from the game will benefit Migdal Ohr, the world’s largest orphanage.

Last time the two teams played almost two years ago, the result was so one-sided (112-85), Richard Goldstone was asked to investigate.

8:08PM: Oh Jerusalem Post, get your freakin’ picture-caption thing-a-me-bob fixed already!

7:44PM: Yesterday, I posted about Dr. Mirella Sidrer, the Israeli woman severely injured by a Grad rocket who ripped Richard Goldstone for excluding her testimony from his final report .

You can view the aforementioned ripping here, and Goldstone’s response here.

5:16PM: Here’s a list of the 20 soon-to-be-released palestinian women prisoners.

Ayat Qaisi – attempted murder

Rujina Riyad Muhammad Jenajra – conspiracy to commit a crime and attempted murder

Rima abu-Ayesha – affiliation with an illegal organization

Heba Asaad Khaleel al-Natsha – attempted murder

Abdullah Khalil –assault on a military official and carrying a knife with intent to harm

Maymona Jabbarin – indicted for attempted murder and carrying a knife with intent to harm. Remanded for duration of proceedings

Jihad abu-Turki – attempted murder and carrying a knife with intent to harm

Bara’ah Malki – attempted murder and carrying a knife with intent to harm

Bukhari Muhammad Saleh Layla – attempted murder

Fatema Yunis Azzeq – indicted for illegal military training, carrying a firearm, attempted murder. Remanded for duration of proceedings.

Neveen Khalil Abdallah Daka – attempted murder

Kifah Bahash – assault on a military official

Linan Yussef Mussa Hanani Abu Gholma – carrying a firearm and attempted murder

Shereen Muhammad Khalil Hassan – attempted murder

Sana Hajajre Salah – attempted murder and carrying a knife with intent to harm

Manal Ziad Muhammad Raja Saba’nah – attempted murder and carrying a knife with intent to harm

Hamdan Abd Jiyad Zuhur – attempted murder

Baid Ahmed Yusuf Hiyam – affiliation with an illegal organization

Nahada Farhat da’areh, indicted for assault on a military official, carrying a knife with intent to harm. Remanded for duration of proceedings.

Nagua Abdelgani – indicted for affiliation with an illegal organization, public disorder. Remanded for duration of proceedings.

Seems like a lovely bunch.

5:12PM: The Jerusalem Post report to which I linked above has been inexplicably toned down.

At the time of my post, it was titled” B’Tselem: Goldstone report is wrong.”

Now, it is titled “Israel at fault for not probing self”

The emphasis of the article has also shifted away from B’Tselem’s problems with the Goldstone Report to their problems with Israel’s conduct.

What’s the bet B’Tselem contacted the Jerusalem Post and demanded the changes?

3:30PM:

Relatives of Fatima Younis Zaq, a Palestinian prisoner held in an Israeli jail, celebrate at her home in Gaza City, September 30, 2009, after receiving news of her upcoming release. Israel will free 20 Palestinian women, one of them Younis Zaq, from jail as early as Friday in exchange for a videotape from Hamas proving an Israeli soldier held in the Gaza Strip since 2006 is alive, officials on both sides said on Wednesday.

The average person seeing this photo and caption may feel happy for the released prisoner and her relieved family, and may be wondering why on earth Israel would imprison this woman.

That’s why I’m here.

In the wake of precise intelligence information, the Israel Security Agency (ISA), on 20 May 2007, at the Erez crossing, arrested two Palestinian women, who admitted to planning to perpetrate a double suicide bombing in crowded places (restaurants, events halls or any locality with a large concentration of soldiers) in Tel Aviv and Netanya. They further admitted that they were guided by Islamic Jihad, which exploited Israel’s humanitarian policy – the two had received medical entry permits into Israel under false pretenses.

Fatima Younes Hassan Zaq, 39, a resident of Gaza, mother of eight children and pregnant with her ninth, had been responsible for an Islamic Jihad Gaza women’s labor office for four years. She had been in contact with Islamic Jihad terrorists and coordinated contacts on their behalf with women who had volunteered to be suicide bombers.

Approximately three months ago, her niece, Rawda Ibrahim Younes Habib, 30, a resident of Gaza and mother of four children, sought her assistance in perpetrating a suicide attack. Zaq, who decided to participate in the attack as well, contacted her Islamic Jihad liaison, who aided the two women in putting their plan into operation.

The two women attended several of their meetings with Islamic Jihad terrorists accompanied by several of their children. Zaq’s 19-year-old son, also an Islamic Jihad terrorist, was present as the two women were photographed – holding copies of the Quran and weapons – before setting out.

In order for Zaq and Habib to enter Israel, an Islamic Jihad terrorist obtained an authentic entry permit which indicated that Habib was due to undergo medical tests at a Ramallah hospital, with Zaq as her attending relative. The terrorist also instructed the two to go to the hospital and actually undergo the test in order to cover their story.

The two women were then instructed to inform Islamic Jihad in Gaza. They were told that an operative would meet them in Ramallah, provide them with explosive belts, and accompany them into Israel. Before leaving Gaza, Zaq and Habib trained in operating explosive belts and in firing an AK-47. They were also instructed on what clothing to wear in order to allay suspicions.

A mother of eight children and pregnant with her ninth, willing to kill innocent people (including her unborn child) and ruin the lives of her living children. They don’t get much more depraved than that.

1:15PM: From the Department of Lopsided Deals:

Israel’s Security Cabinet has approved the release of 20 female Palestinian prisoners and detainees in exchange for proof that captive Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit held in the Gaza Strip is alive.

If I was a palestinian, I’d be offended that my leaders place such a small value on our lives (proof of 1 Israeli life = 20 palestinian lives)

1:12PM: Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is set to present a proposal to his cabinet tomorrow for the establishment of an investigative committee to probe the findings of the Goldstone report.

No, not to investigate IDF conduct during Operation Cast Lead, but to examine how Goldstone arrived at his erroneous conclusions.

Top officials in Jerusalem have stated that the report is full of lies and distortions, which demand an examination of how Goldstone arrived at his conclusions.

Sources in Defense Minister Ehud Barak’s bureau denied Wednesday reports that Barak had called for the establishment of an investigative committee into the Goldstone report, but confirmed that Barak asked former Israel Chief Justice Aharon Barak to support efforts to challenge the UN report’s findings.

12:30PM: Joke of the day: Although, I’m not laughing.

Libya, Iran Accuse Israel of ‘Genocide’ at U.N. Human Rights Council

Israel was in the dock at the U.N. Human Rights Council Tuesday, as nation after nation praised as “balanced” and “objective” a report accusing the Jewish state of war crimes during its offensive against Hamas in Gaza last winter.

Envoys for Iran and Libya added “genocide” to the charge sheet, although the head of a fact finding mission that compiled the document, South African Judge Richard Goldstone, said later that doing so was “misuse of our report.”

The delegations taking part in an “interactive dialogue” following Goldstone’s presentation of the report in Geneva fell into two broad categories, reflecting the divisions that have long characterized the world body’s top human rights organ.

Countries representing the Arab, Islamic, African and “non-aligned” blocs pressed for support for a resolution at the Human Rights Council (HRC) this week endorsing the recommendations of the Goldstone report “in full.

Notice how the nations endorsing the report’s recommendations are those with the worst human rights records in the world.

9:25AM: Yesterday, I posted this claim by the JIDF blog that my Facebook account, amongst others, was marked for deactivation. Given that I had not heard anything from Facebook, I treated this claim with skepticism, as I do all unsubstantiated claims.

Well today, lo and behold, my account has been deactivated, despite my not having received any warning about it from Facebook.

I’m currently considering my options.

6:15AM: Here is the US’ troubling reaction to the Report at the same UNHRC session.

Notice how they are asking Israel to probe possible war crimes, just like Hamas.

5:55AM: Yesterday, a British court rejected a petition urging an arrest warrant for Defense Minister Ehud Barak since he committed “war crimes” during Operation Cast Lead, on the grounds he enjoys diplomatic immunity and therefore cannot be prosecuted. But the lawyer who orchestrated the petition has vowed to continue pursuing legal action against any Israeli official who arrives in the UK.

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Last night, the IAF struck a rocket launching device in the Gaza Strip, which was aimed at Israel and set to fire. This followed a day in which palestinians fired 4 Qassam rockets and multiple mortar shells at Israel, and opened fire at IDF troops patrolling the border fence between Israel and Gaza.

In other words, the most “productive” day for palestinian terrorists in quite a while. Did I mention it was also the holiest day in the Jewish calendar?

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

10:15PM: In a busy evening for palestinian terrorists, they fired two Qassams into Israel and shot an Israeli earlier this evening.

10:04PM: Yet another example of the Goldstone Report’s irrelevance.

Dr. Mirella Sidrer, who was severely injured last May when a Grad rocket struck her clinic in Ashkelon, spoke on Tuesday against Justice Richard Goldstone, who led a UN committee to investigate  human rights violations during the Gaza war, saying he excluded her testimony from his final report .

Sidrer spoke during a one-day hearing held by the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. “I don’t understand why my testimony wasn’t taken into account,” she said, “Especially by justice Goldstone, who sent me a letter saying he appreciated my testimony”.

Sidrer presented the committee with pictures and news articles showing the events that took place following the missile strike. Following her injuries, Sidrer had to undergo seven operations, and still has a long way to go until she is fully recovered.

According to sidrer, when the Goldstone Report was published, she was astonished to find her testimony had been excluded: “It was important that this time, all UN delegates hear what I have to say, as opposed to only Justice Goldstone and the committee.

“When I received the report, I searched for my testimony only to find my name mentioned in two or three lines on page 460… It said that a rocket was fired without warning on the shopping mall where I was injured. I don’t understand why my testimony was not taken into account.”

I guess she’s not considered a reliable witness like Mr Sex Gum.

7:52PM: The following post from a group called the JIDF has been brought to my attention:

YOM KIPPUR FACEBOOK CLAMPDOWN ON THE JEWS: Chabad, AISH, IDF, Arutz Sheva, and others threatened for deactivation!

Facebook plans to make good on their threat to deactivate the account of the founder of the JIDF within 48 hours, it has come to our attention that many other accounts of Jews, pro-Israel activists, bloggers, and others on Facebook are also at risk to be deactivated very soon. These accounts have thousands of friends, personal correspondence, photos, group and page admin privileges, etc.

Facebook will soon deactivate all of them, if the people behind them do not agree to provide government-issued identification and agree to change the names of the following accounts to a “real” name (or remove any religious title):

[follows is a list of Facebook accounts including my own]

For the record, I have never received a warning or threat that my Facebook account will be deactivated. If anyone from the JIDF is reading this, feel free to let me know why you have reason to believe my Facebook account is about to go the way of the Dodo bird.

7:38PM: Prof. Amnon Rubinstein, Professor of Law at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya (Israel), a former Minister of Education and Knesset Member, as well as the recipient of the 2006 Israel Prize in Law, finds some humor in the Goldstone report (translated from Hebrew):

Goldstone’s Unconscious Humor

It is not true that the Goldstone report is exclusively anti-Israeli. After having established that Israel is guilty of crimes against international law and (possibly) humanity, after advocating punishing it with and arsenal of all conceivable sanctions, it also chides the Palestinians for some inappropriate measures taken by them.

First, there is Hamas. Goldstone does not let them go Scot free. Thus he blames the Hamas for a grievous offense:

“The mission remains unconvinced that any genuine and effective initiatives have been taken by the (Gaza) authorities to address the serious issues of violation of international human rights in the conduct of armed activities by militant groups in the Gaza strip”.

This refers to the shelling of southern Israel from Gaza in the eight years preceding operation “cast lead”. But what does Goldstone have in mind when he chides the Hamas for not taking genuine and effective initiative against the militants who do not adhere to international human law? Does he refer to their failure to petition the local High Court of Justice to issue a writ of mandamus against the militants? Or does he have in mind the fact that the Hamas Solicitor General has failed to issue an indictment against the offending militants?

Judge Goldstone rebukes the Hamas again for their treatment of Fattah ‘affiliates’. Goldstone finds that “such actions” – i.e. killing the Fatah detainees – “constitute serious violations of Human Rights or the Palestinian Basic Law”. Again, one may ask: what went wrong here? Did the Hamas Supreme Court of Justice ignore the Palestinian Basic Law? Where was the Hamas attorney general? Goldstone is not content with slapping Hamas’ wrist, he also reprimands the Palestinian authority:

“The Palestinian Authority continues to discharge a large number of civil and military service employees, or suspend their salaries, under the pretext of “non-adherence to the legitimate authority” or “non-obtainment of security approval” on their appointments, which has become a pre-requirement for enrolment in public service”. In effect, this measure means the exclusion of Hamas supporters or affiliates from public sector appointment…. The Mission is of the view that the reported measures are inconsistent with the Palestinian Authority’s obligations deriving from the Universal Declaration on Human Rights and the Palestinian Basic Law”. In other words, the PA is obliged, by international law, to employ those who want to unseat them.

This surely is an uncontrollable outburst of surreal humor but it pales in comparison with another outburst.

Goldstone, after quoting heavily from Ha’aretz, Israeli jurists, B’tzelem and other Israeli human right NGO’s, states.

“…the Mission received allegations that sources of criticism of actions by Israel during and following the military operations of December 2008-January 2009 from inside Israel were subjected to attempted or actual repression, and that the rights of freedom of association and expression for individuals and groups had been violated. In this regard, concerns were also raised about the denial of access to the media and to human rights monitors prior, during and after the military operations in Gaza”.

The humor stems from the fact that the evidence of this repression was given by Israelis – including those who addressed Goldstone’s committee. Israeli NGO’s who complained about this repression of dissent appear almost daily – loud and clear – on Israeli newspapers and state – owned radio and television.

For some obscure reason, there is no parallel finding about suppression of dissent by Hamas. Indeed, the report should have a sub-heading – Eyeless in Gaza – lifted from John Milton and Aldous Huxley.

* * *

The humor stops where the report alleges actions of wanton brutality and killings by Israeli soldiers; even if only partially true, these cases should be a reason for sleepless nights for every law-abiding, humane Israeli. The IDF authorities state that they have investigated these allegations and, except for one case of looting, found no evidence of such war crimes. However, it is the opinion of this author that due to the severity of the allegations and the number of Palestinian civilians killed in the operation, Israel should re-investigate these thirty-plus cases and that this reinvestigation should be conducted by an independent body headed by an acting or retired judge of the Supreme Court. Such a body should be empowered to see army documents and make recommendations. This step is vital not because of Goldstone’s ludicrous report, replete with its instances of unconscious humor, but because we, Israelis, must be doubly sure that no crimes were perpetrated by our soldiers. We should not be “eyeless in Gaza”.

5:12PM: A group of palestinians is seeking an arrest warrant in the UK for Defense Minister Ehud Barak for alleged war crimes.

Barak decided not to change his plans for his UK visit, with his bureau releasing a statement saying: “No arrest warrant has been issued, and in any event, he has immunity due to his being a minister in the government.”

On Tuesday, two London law firms representing the group – Irvine Thanvi and Natas (ITN) and Imran Khan and Partners – applied for an international arrest warrant at Westminster Magistrates court in central London, claiming that Barak committed war crimes and breaches of the Geneva Convention during Operation Cast Lead.

Barak is currently in the UK and is set to address a Labour Friends of Israel (LFI) reception during the Labour Party’s annual conference in Brighton, on the south coast of England, on Tuesday night.

The move came after 16 Palestinians from the Gaza Strip instructed Al-Mezan, a Gaza-based human rights group, to issue the charges. Al-Mezan in turn instructed the two London firms to represent the group.

A spokesman for ITN told The Jerusalem Post that an arrest warrant has been lodged and that the biggest hurdle would be Barak’s diplomatic immunity.

However, the spokesman said that he was confident that they have a strong legal argument which would override the issue of immunity.

He said that the court would decide on Tuesday afternoon if there was a case and added that if the court had not decided by the afternoon, they would issue an injunction to stop Barak from leaving the country.

A loophole in British law – in the International Criminal Court Act 2001 and the Criminal Justice Act 1988 – allows private individual complaints of “war crimes” to be lodged against military personnel, even if they are not British citizens and the alleged crimes were committed elsewhere.

2:56PM: UN investigator Richard Goldstone has defended his report accusing Israel of war crimes during Operation Cast Lead.

Speaking to the UN Human Rights Council on Tuesday, Goldstone defended the UN Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict’s report, which found that both Israel and Palestinian armed groups had committed actions which amounted to war crimes, as well as possibly crimes against humanity.

The judge urged the committee to refer the report to the UN Security Council, citing the fact that neither Israeli nor Hamas had carried out any internal investigations into Operation Cast Lead. Should parties fail to respond to Security Council demands, he said, the matter would be forwarded to the International Criminal Court.

“Now is the time for action,” Goldstone told the Human Rights Council. “A culture of impunity in the region has existed for too long. The lack of accountability for war crimes and possible crimes against humanity has reached a crisis point; the ongoing lack of justice is undermining any hope for a successful peace process and reinforcing an environment that fosters violence. Time and again, experience has taught us that overlooking justice only leads to increased conflict and violence.”

—-

Israeli Ambassador Aharon Leshno-Yaar described the report as “shameful,” claiming it cherry-picked incidents during the conflict for political effect, ignored Israel’s right to self-defense, and provided “support and vindication for terrorist tactics.”

—-

“Israel is committed to fully examining every allegation of wrongdoing, not because of this report, but despite it,” Leshno-Yaar told the council.

Goldstone, however, has called Israel’s efforts so far “pusillanimous.” He also described investigations by Hamas as a “complete failure.”

I guess Goldstone is paid well to use big words like “”pusillanimous” (it apparently means “cowardly”), but he should also be conducting his investigations properly. There are many problems with the report, some of which have already been discussed, and others which will soon see the light of day.

2:04PM: Jerusalem Post caption blooper of the day:

Alternatively, that’s one ugly bastard. And he’s possibly related to this chief Akbar:

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Most of the time.

(Thanks to Soccer Dad for the heads up on the first photo)