U.S. to Israel: Investigate Goldstone Report Allegations
The Obama administration is urging Israel to address the allegations in the Goldstone Commission report.
“We felt very strongly that while these investigations should be investigated and addressed, that we thought on the one hand that Israel had the kind of institutions that could address these allegations,” Ian Kelly, a State Department spokesman, said Monday, speaking of the U.S. role last week in deferring until March further United Nations consideration of the report accusing Israel and Hamas of war crimes during last winter’s Gaza military action. “And of course, we urged Israel to address these very serious allegations.”
U.S. officials had said previously that the report, its recommendations and the mandate creating the fact-finding mission were flawed. The United States backed a failed resolution in the U.N. Human Rights Council that encouraged Israel to investigate the report’s findings. Instead, Palestinian diplomats – who wanted the council to refer the report to the U.N. legal system – agreed to defer consideration until its next session in March.
Kelly’s comment Monday was the most direct urging Israel to pursue an investigation.
Israeli spokesmen have said that the army is investigating some of the charges, including those involving the killing of civilians bearing white flags, but no charges have been filed.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO