Yet more evidence that the recent Gaza war was a travesty:
A United Nations fact-finding mission investigating the three-week war in Gaza issued a lengthy, scathing report on Tuesday that concluded that both the Israeli military and Palestinian armed groups committed actions amounting to war crimes, and possibly crimes against humanity.
The four-member mission, led by Justice Richard Goldstone, a widely respected South African judge, also concluded that neither Israel nor the Palestinian groups had carried out any “credible investigations” into the alleged violations. If that did not change within six months, the United Nations Security Council should refer the situation to the International Criminal Court in the Hague for possible prosecution, the panel concluded.
“The prolonged situation of impunity has created a justice crisis in the Occupied Palestinian Territory that warrants action,” the members said in their 574-page report on the war, during which some 1,300 Palestinians were killed, including at least several hundred civilians; as well as 13 Israelis: 10 soldiers and 3 civilians.
Israel reacted quickly, saying in a statement issued by its diplomatic mission in Geneva that it did not cooperate with the investigation but had opened many of its own. The statement said the mission’s mandate “was clearly one-sided and ignored the thousands of Hamas missile attacks on civilians in southern Israel that made the Gaza operation necessary.” But the statement added that Israel would “read the report carefully.”