U.N.: Goldstone Would Have To Request Report Be Rescinded
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.
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.
“We know a lot more today about what happened in the Gaza war of 2008-09 than we did when I chaired the fact-finding mission appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Council that produced what has come to be known as the Goldstone Report,” Goldstone wrote. “If I had known then what I know now, the Goldstone Report would have been a different document.”
Meanwhile, the Israeli daily Yediot Achronot, citing an unnamed source close to Goldstone, reported Sunday that the former South African judge first approached The New York Times to print his Op-Ed, but that the newspaper turned him down.
“We do not comment on our editing and reporting procedures,” The New York Times said in response.
But Politico’s Ben Smith reported Monday that a “source familiar with the paper’s dealings” said that Goldstone approached the Times a couple weeks ago with a “very different” Op-Ed that did not repudiate the Goldstone Report’s claim that Israel intentionally targeted civilians.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30
