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Procedural Flaws (In)Credulity Double Standards, CAMERA, 2/10/09
Procedural Flaws (In)Credulity Double Standards, CAMERA, 2/10/09
| Double Standards, CAMERA, 2/10/09 |
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This is a section from a larger article by CAMERA. It outlines a systematic disparity in the way the committe considered evidence: if it were Palestinian, the most generous reliance was extended; if it was Israeli, a hermeneutic of suspicion essentially eliminated anything that supported Israeli claims. Â Few analyses give a better sense of the prejudiced (in)credulity of the judges.
The Goldstone Mission either chose not to investigate, ignored or outright dismissed evidence that supported Israeli government allegations, but chose to accept problematic evidence by Palestinian or pro-Palestinian groups that would support charges of Israeli culpability.
• The Report notes an assertion by an Islamic Jihad figher that he and his fellow fighters "stay away from houses" if possible, and stated that this assertion "suggests the absence of intent" to use civilians as shields. It then notes that three Hamas fighters said Palestinain combatants did indeed fire from near homes with the hope that the the presence of civilians would shield them from an Israeli response, but in this case the Report does not state that this suggests the presence of intent to use civilians. In effect, the Report disregarded the admission by the Hamas fighters, concluding that "the Mission found no evidence" Palestinians sought to use Palestinian civilians to shield them from attack. (See paragraph 451, which quotes International Crisis Group interviews with the Islamic Jihad and Hamas fighters.)
• Purported contradictions and and falsehoods by Israel were deemed a blow to Israeli credibility, while the same by Palestinian and pro-Palestinian sources were dismissed or ignored.
About Israel's assertion that its strike on the Fakhura area was in response to mortar fire, the Report states that the Mission "considers the credibility of Israel's position damaged by the series of inconsistencies, contradictions and factual inaccuracies in the statements justifying the attack." This doubt is cast despite the fact that, as noted above, Palestinian witnesses reported that terrorists were firing from the area.
Meanwhile, when discussing the case of Khalid Abd Rabbo, about which numerous inconsistencies and contradictions had been cited, the Report asserts, "The Mission found Khalid and Kawthar Abd Rabbo to be credible and reliable witnesses. It has no reason to doubt the veracity of the main elements of their testimony."
Just as actual contradictions by the Palestinain family are ignored, supposed "contradictions" by Israel are concocted. Paragraphs 829 and 830 of the Report state:
The authors seemed so eager to charge Israel with contradictions, they apparently did not bother to carefully read its response, which in fact contains no contradictions. Israel's response indicates that there was indeed a missle attack that killed Hamas operatives, but that this attack was not against a mosque, two points which are perfectly compatible with each other. Below is a more complete version of Israel's statement:
Israel's insistence that the strike which damaged the mosque and killed a number of Palestinians was not an attack against the mosque itself is also consistent with the Report's statement that the missile struck "near the doorway of the mosque." Indeed, elsewhere in the Report, it is stated that given the precision of Israel's weapons, "what was struck was meant to be struck." Apparently, though, the Report's authors feel that this conclusion only holds when it can be used against Israel, but not when it might reveal that the mosque itself was not targeted.
• The Report cites an admission by a Hamas parliamentarian that Palestinians use human shields only to deny that the assertion should be regarded as evidence. Paragraphs 475 and 476 assert:
Interestingly, while the Report concluded that the statement did not constitute evidence that "Hamas forced Palestinian civilians to shield military objectives," it did not comment on whether it constituted evidence that Hamas violated the obligation under customary international humanitarian law that, as the Report describes alsewhere, dictates "each party to the conflict must, to the extent feasible, avoid locating military objectives within or near densely populated areas" and that "each party to the conflict must, to the extent feasible remove civilian persons and objects under its control from the vicinity of military objectives." It seems obvious that Fathi Hammad's statement does constitute an admission of violating these precepts, but the Report avoids staying as much.
Perhaps, then, the Report does not believe assertions by Palestinian politicians to constitute evidence of Palestinian wrongdoing. But when it comes to assertions by Israeli politicians, it surely does. Paragraphs 1200-1202 cite statements made by Israeli politicians, followed by paragraph 1203's assertion that "It is in the context of comments such as these that the massive destruction of businesses, agricultural land, chicken farms and residential houses has to be understood."
If the Report authors had a consistent standard, they surely should have similarly said it is in the context of Fathi Hammad's aforementioned statement that Palestinian fighting from among civilians, and civilian casualties, must be understood. Not only did the authors avoid drawing the connection, but as noted above, they essentially dismissed Hammad's assertion as irrelevant.
Another double standard is evident in the Report's use of quotations by Israeli leaders as described above, but its refusal to consider other statements by Israeli leaders that cast doubt on the report's conclusions. (See Double Standard: Motive below.)
Paragraphs 19 and 160 of the Report note that the Mission reviewed 1,200 photographs. Of those, it casts doubt only on the credibility of photographs by Israelis. Paragraph 449 of the Report asserts:
(A footnote after the reference to "several of the submissions it received" cites a submission by Israeli Maurice Ostroff.)
The report accepted without caveat, though, photographs of Gaza's al Quds hospital (Report, paragraphs 595 and 609); photographs taken by Mu'een Juha of his Gaza house (paragraph 754); "reliable" photographs of the al Muqadamah mosque, photographs published online by Gaza's "semi-public" Coastal Municipalities Water Utility" (paragraph 973, footnote); and photographs of the house of Wa'el Samouni (paragraph 993).
While the Goldstone Commission falsely attributes nefarious intent to Israeli actions in order to indict the state with war crimes, its members do precisely the opposite with Hamas militants — they suggest Palestinian militants lacked intention to abuse civilians — in order to exonerate them from war crimes.
ISRAEL
Motive was freely attributed to Israel in order to charge them with war crimes. Paragraph 74 of the Report asserts:
The conditions of life in Gaza, resulting from deliberate actions of the Israeli forces and the declared policies of the Government of Israel – as they were presented by its authorized and legitimate representatives – with regard to the Gaza Strip before, during and after the military operation, cumulatively indicate the intention to inflict collective punishment on the people of the Gaza Strip in violation of international humanitarian law.  But government and IDF officials stated just the opposite. For example, the IDF screened the following message from Capt. Benjamin Rutland on January 3, 2009, when the IDF sent ground troops into Gaza, to articulate and make clear the IDF's mission and goals: Other examples abound. On December 25, 2008, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said at a press briefing that
And on January 4, 2009, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said
We are not fighting the Palestinians – we are fighting Hamas, a terrorist organization which controls the Gaza Strip. True, there are also civilian casualties, but we are trying to avoid civilian casualties, even though it is not easy while Hamas is targeting our civilians. (The existence of these statements is evidence of the Report's double standard with regard to determining [or avoiding determining] motive, but also of its double standard with regard to statements by politicians. Although the implications of these statements are ignored, the Report did cite other statements by Tzipi Livni and others when they determined that those statements helped to condemn Israel. (See above section: Double Standard: Acceptance of Evidence.)
Elsewhere in the Report, similar conclusions about nefarious Israeli motives were freely reached:
50. ...The Mission... finds that [Israel's] destruction of the [Al Bader] mill was carried out for the purposes of denying sustenance to the civilian population, which is a violation of customary international law and may constitute a war crime. The Report acknowledges that the mill was the tallest building in the area, that Israeli troops occupied and used the upper floors of the mill after the airstrike, and that, during the operation in general, Israel felt that “because roads and buildings were often mined, IDF forces had to target them to protect themselves.†All of this could lead a rational observer to determine that the mill was not fired on for the purposes of denying sustenance, but rather in order to clear potential mines and fighters from a high-ground military objective that Israel deemed important to occupy during the fighting. The writers, however, did not let these facts get in the way of indicting Israel.
That Israel's attack was "for the purposes of denying sustenance to the civilian population" is further belied by the fact that the country actually increased humanitarian aid, which includes food aid, to the Palestinians during Operation Cast Lead.
During Operation Cast Lead, the following humanitarian aid was transferred from Israel into Gaza:
Even on January 9 — the day Israel was said to have taken over the Al Bader mill — 41 trucks carrying food products and electrical equipment entered Gaza via Israel's Kerem Shalom crossing. And over the following week, 622 more trucks carrying more than 15,000 tons of food, medical supplies and humanitarian aid were transferred to the territory.
Indeed, Israel points out that it transfered 14,208 tons of flour into Gaza during the war, or an average of 618 tons/day. Not only is this quantity significantly more flour than the 220 metric tons the Al Bader mill could have produced in a day; but more strikingly, it is well over the 450 tons/day that the UN and theWorld Food Programme say Gaza needs.
Israel also implemented a daily humanitarian recess (ceasefire) in order to facilitate the transfer of humanitarian supplies.
PALESTINIANS
In fact, the Mission did come across evidence that Palestinian combatants mingled with the civilian population in order to shield themselves from Israeli attack. The evidence, an admission by Hamas fighters, is especially telling considering the obvious reasons (related to both domestic and international politics) that loyal Palestinian troops would deny such behavior. In January 2009, the International Crisis Group interviewed Hamas fighters, who told the interviewers that, as the ICG paraphrased it, "combatants often fired in close proximity to homes and from alleys, hoping that nearby civilians would deter Israel from responding." The Goldstone Report acknowledged the existence of this evidence, but clearly disregarded it when concluding that it found no evidence Palestinian combatants intended to shield themselves from attack by mingling with civilians.
Paragraph 937 and 938Â of the Report assert:
This interpretation of the Convention is, prima facie, a travesty of the Convention's intent. The first article of theConvention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women defines "discrimination against women" as
The idea that Israel's strikes on food and water-related infrastructure, or anything else in Gaza, were "made on the basis of sex" in order to specifically distinguish, exclude or restrict women from their right to equality is simply outlandish.
The Commission's interpretation of international law (specifically, its questionable insistence that Gaza should still be considered "occupied" even after Israel had fully withdrawn its military and citizens from the territory) helps it to level such charges against Israel but not against Palestinians. But based on the Report's interpretation of what the Convention deems "discrimination against women," there would clearly be Palestinian violations.
For example, in the same way that damage to food infrastructure can be (however loosely) interpreted as discrimination against women's right to nutrition during pregnancy and lactation, as the report argues, Palestinian rocket attacks into Sderot and other towns, which kept people in doors and away from playgrounds, would be a violation of the right for women "to participate in recreational activities" described in the convention. Considering the damage Palestinian rocket attacks have done to homes in southern Israel, these attacks would also violate of the right of women "to enjoy adequate living conditions, particularly in relation to housing...." Needless to say, though, the Report refrained from suggesting that Hamas's rocket attacks against Israel constituted discrimination against women.
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