Editorial Washington Times, October 19, 2009.
Suppose a United Nations investigation team found that the United States had
committed war crimes in its response to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. The
report finds that while al Qaeda may have been culpable for the attacks and the
carnage they wreaked, America was equally to blame - if not more so - for the
civilian deaths caused during Operation Enduring Freedom. The U.N. instructs
the United States to conduct an internal investigation and punish the
perpetrators, or face action from the International Criminal Court.
This is the framework established by the Goldstone Commission Report, which
is the product of an investigation led by South African judge Richard Goldstone.
Its target was Israel's war against the Hamas terrorist group in Gaza last
January. The United Nations Human Rights Council endorsed the report on
Friday, and it will now move to the international body's New York headquarters
for further action.
On a factual level, the Goldstone report is notoriously flawed and one-sided.
Much of the 575-page document was cut and pasted from unsubstantiated and
suspect reports from nongovernmental organizations with openly anti-Israel
sentiments. Some of the "witnesses" interviewed by the mission were disguised
Hamas officials. The fact that Hamas loves the report should raise eyebrows
about its contents.
Even more troublingly is the report's fatal moral blind spot, which is ignoring
the differences between Israel, a sovereign state, and Hamas, a terrorist
organization. The Israeli armed forces are professional organizations governed
by strict policies to limit civilian deaths during the conduct of war. Israel is a
signatory to the Geneva conventions and respects the rights of noncombatants.
After the conflict, Israel conducted some 100 investigations into reports of
misconduct by its troops.
Killing civilians is central to Hamas' military doctrine. Hamas launched 7,000
rocket and mortar attacks on Israeli cities between the pullout from Gaza in
2005 and 2009. During the ground fighting in Gaza, Hamas routinely used
mosques, schools and hospitals as military sites and employed civilians as
human shields. Hamas exploited the chaos of the conflict to round up
Palestinian political opponents, some of whom were crippled with shots to the
legs, while others were reportedly executed.
There is no moral equality between Hamas and Israel any more than there is
between al Qaeda and the United States. Yet under the Goldstone logic,
terrorists and sovereign states are identical. The incidental, unintentional civilian
deaths Israel caused during the Gaza conflict are condemned as war crimes; the
widespread and intentional Hamas attacks on Israeli civilians are basically
ignored.
The Goldstone model makes it impossible for civilized states to strike
effectively against the world's barbarians who are fighting a shadow war
against decency that views innocent noncombatants as both legitimate targets
and useful shields.
The United States voted against the report and will presumably use its veto
power if action is taken before the Security Council. America would do well to
make it clear, publicly and privately, that it will not countenance the report or
its twisted logic, nor endorse any moves to level the playing field between
terror organizations and civilized states. If this movement gains traction, one
day the United States will be in the dock.
