U.S. Congress votes 344-36 to denounce the Goldstone report.
Latest Updates: Goldstone report RSS
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abunoor
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johnpi
Israeli PM vows to “delegitimize” UN Gaza report.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised a lengthy diplomatic battle to “delegitimize” the United Nations charges that Israel committed war crimes in its deadly bombardment of the Gaza Strip, an official said on Saturday.
The U.N. Human Rights Council singled out the Jewish state for censure in a resolution on Friday, while endorsing a report by South African jurist Richard Goldstone which condemned both Israeli and Hamas actions in a war last December and January.
Netanyahu, who has said the Goldstone report could undermine U.S.-sponsored Middle East peace moves, was quoted as saying Israel would wage a protracted struggle against the criticism.
Abu Aardvark had the best response to this: “If Netanyahu decided to walk away from peace talks, how would anyone be able to tell the difference?”
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thabet
A question from Nick Kabat, a student at the University of Buffalo, forced Tony Blair to respond to (and lie, dodge, waffle around) the Goldstone report. Apparently, the question was ‘unmoderated’ and upset the university’s vice president.
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thabet
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johnpi
Richard Silverstein sheds light on some interesting facts about Libya’s status at the UN that makes the Goldstone report – which indicts Israel for war crimes – an issue that can’t be easily dispensed with a security council veto from the US.
Libya not only sits on the Security Council, it also is president of the General Assembly. So that means that Qaddafi has the U.S. over a boulder twice over. If the U.S. vetoes Security Council consideration of the Report, Libya can introduce it before the General Assembly, where we don’t have veto. If Abbas hadn’t singed himself so badly in mishandling this affair, he might’ve been able to weasel out of this by telling Libya to take a hike. But Hamas already has his ass in a sling over his betrayal of the Gazans. He can’t very well dump Goldstone twice.
So Obama may have the Goldstone nightmare return to haunt him in the Security Council. It might even be passed by the General Assembly. So much for our president’s supposed political adeptness.
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johnpi
UN council mulls emergency meet on Gaza report.
The United Nations Security Council will hold closed-door consultations on Wednesday to consider whether to accept a Libyan request for a meeting mainly to discuss a U.N. report that accused Israel and Palestinian fighters of war crimes during Israel’s assault of Gaza, diplomats said.
Libya’s deputy ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi told AFP that his country circulated a letter on behalf of the U.N. Arab group requesting “an emergency meeting” of the 15-member body to consider the U.N. report.
….A spokesman for Libya’s U.N. mission, Ahmed Gebreel, said his country, which currently has a Security Council seat, had requested a meeting “because of the seriousness of the report and because we think it’s too long to wait until March.”
“We are welcoming Libya’s step that they have asked the Security Council to meet to discuss the Goldstone report,” Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas said in a telephone conversation from Rome.
“Libya’s step is supporting the Palestinian people’s rights.”
Critics of the Palestinian Authority have accused Abbas of letting his people down by agreeing to the postponement. A statement by the Palestinian observer mission at the United Nations said it fully supported the Libyan request for a Security Council meeting.
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johnpi
Palestinians to ask UN to pass Goldstone report after all.
The move appeared to mark a change in position, as the Palestinian delegation on Friday backed a move at the U.N. Human Rights Council to defer a vote on whether the report should be passed on.
Erakat said Abbas’s decision came “in light of the controversy that has arisen” around the report, which accused Israel and Palestinian armed groups of committing war crimes during the three-week land, air and sea assault on Gaza that Israel started on Dec. 27.
“We want to discuss the report in international bodies so they will take decisions on what emerged in the report, in order to insure that the crimes committed by Israel against our people are never repeated,” he said.
….The Palestinian Islamist Hamas movement ruling Gaza has led a chorus of criticism of the move, accusing Abbas of betraying the 1,400 Palestinians killed in Israel’s.
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johnpi
Marc Lynch considers the ramifications to the Obama administration and the Palestinian Authority of the stifling of the Goldstone report (via Richard Silverstein).
The most likely tactical considerations behind the administration’s decision [to block Goldstone] seem short-sighted. Its move likely responded to the intense public and private Israeli campaign against the report, and probably aimed at winning back some positive relations with the Israelis and maintaining momentum on the peace process. But if the administration’s hope was that killing the report would make the issue quietly go away while winning some political capital with the Israelis, it is likely to be disappointed. Quite the contrary: the report is becoming a major political issue in the Arab world, badly damaging the legitimacy of the Palestinian Authority, while Obama seems to be getting little credit from Israeli public opinion or the Israeli government.
…There seems to be little question that Abbas’s decision to go along with American pressure will have a significant impact on the popularity and legitimacy of the PA…Whatever gains made by Fatah after its Bethlehem conference and by Fayyad with the announcement of his agenda for a Palestinian state are likely to be washed away in this deluge. The credibility of the Hamas narrative about the PA’s collaboration with Israel and unrepresentative nature will be strongly enhanced. And it will not help Salam Fayyad establish authority that he has been fingered by some sources as the person directly responsible for the decision.
Why was the PA leadership put in this untenable situation?
Lynch goes on to point out that the Israelis seem to have taken the American protection for granted while continuing to villify and dismiss Obama. Lose-lose for Obama all the way around.
