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The Goldstone Report: The Legacy of the Landmark Investigation of the Gaza Conflict

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A friend was staying over at our place and left her copy of this book. I picked it up to quickly look over (curious since it was about the Goldstone Report which I haven't heard about in the news for a long time) and got sucked in. I've since bought myself a copy. Although you might think a UN report would be dry or boring (and trust, I thought it was going to be), it's amazingly engaging to read. In particular, it's hard not to be moved by the testimonies of people scattered throughout the report. The essays were good too, especially the intro by Naomi Klein (she's always an interesting read) and the article by Laila El-Haddad (short, but amazing).

If you've had a hard time following the saga of the Goldstone report, I suggest you read this volume. Not only does it include an abridged version of the report (which makes it readable for a layperson like myself) but it also has essays from various experts that offer context. This is a challenging read but an important one for any one looking to understand Goldstone, Gaza or Israel/Palestine. Instead of following the back and forth debate in the news media I highly encourage you to look at the report itself and allow the facts to speak louder than the talking heads on TV.

If you care about this issue then this is the one book that you have to read, right now. The subject: The Goldstone Report which was buried in the US. This book is superbly and thoughtfully done and you will have read the Goldstone Report.

The Goldstone Report is a work of fiction. This is what should have been a fair and unbiased fact-finding exercise conducted by a world-renowned judge and his three 'expert' colleagues. The four authors of the report have displayed shocking bias in their determination to paint Israel as the criminal and the real criminals as the victims. From the very start it was plain that this was what the UNHRC wanted.

The mandate handed to Goldstone was deeply flawed and one-sided by his own admission: it read in part: '...strongly condemning the on-going Israeli military operation which has resulted in massive violations of the human rights of the Palestine people and systematic destruction of Palestinian infrastructure.' You don't need to be a genius to know where this is going. This is BEFORE the mission was assembled. Former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson was originally asked to head it up but rightly refused on the grounds that it was not only biased but that the Council made a practice of '...adopting resolutions guided not by human rights but by politics. This is very regrettable.'

The mission was tainted from the outset. Christine Chinkin, LSE professor and barrister with the Matrix Chambers, should have recused herself at the outset on the grounds that she had previously signed an open letter (to the London Times, I believe) entitled 'Israel's Bombardment of Gaza is not Self-Defence - It Is a War Crime.' Of course she didn't recuse herself. The other three, including Goldstone himself, had displayed their attitude by writing open letters elsewhere that showed similar bias. The team must have been chosen on the basis of their hostility to Israel.

I haven't space or time to go into the dozens of examples of this anti-Israel bias, but believe me, there are many. At least Goldstone, forced into a half-hearted retraction after all the damage had been done, has seen his reputation shredded. He refuses now to engage in public debate on his report.

The way the UNHRC behaved was truly shameful. What makes me so angry is the damage this has done to Israel, because although a mountain of literature has grown from those who have subsequently exposed the incompetence, flawed methodology, bigotry and plain lies (yes LIES!) contained in the Report, the effects of its publication are so profound they will probably never be fully redressed. After all, aren't first impressions the most important?

I will say something about impressions though. The report states several times that on the basis of evidence it received it finds that Israel did deliberately target Palestinian civilians. i.e. that Israel committed mass murder. That evidence was given in the presence of Hamas fighters, and never in camera. Some time earlier Hamas gunmen had entered a Gaza hospital and executed, in their beds, 12 Palestinians the gunmen said had been 'collaborators.' So those witnesses for the prosecution were acutely aware of what would happen if they did not recount the Hamas version. Not only that, but for reasons Goldstone has never adequately explained, he insisted the mission's hearings be conducted live on TV! Was he mad? Or was he malign? Either way, those witness statements were obvious;t delivered under duress. And evidence to the contrary freely available then as now on the Web was ignored. Impressions that will linger in the memory of all viewers at the time unaware of what I have just written.

As the Holocaust recedes from living memory so does antisemism continue its steady crawl from the pit. And this report belongs in a museum of antisemitism, alongside the Protocols, Kein Kampf and copies of Der Sturmer.

By the way, I am not a Jew, just an unremarkable Englishman, baffled by the unprecedented demonisation of Israel that has proceeded apace over more than sixty years.

This book is an incredibly important contribution to the discourse on Israel/Palestine and American foreign policy in general. It brings this vital document into our living rooms for real dissection and digestion, and includes commentary from an all-star panel of thinkers to put the Goldstone Report into its historic context and the context of American and Israeli reactions and policies.

As Representative Brian Baird said, "I read the entire Goldstone Report, front to back, and I read it critically. And after all the flak it had taken, I thought, Well, what am I missing here? I didn't have any beef with it at all. In fact, it was absolutely consistent with everything we had seen and heard in Gaza and Sderot. I found the report and the conclusions to be fact-based, measured, and completely justified. So when a congressional resolution was put forward attacking the Goldstone Report and urging the administration to "unequivocally block any further consideration in any multilateral forum," I was deeply upset and determined both to speak out in support of the report and against the biased and distorted resolution that attacked it."

Alas, Baird is one of the very few to stand up in defense of truth, law, and justice. With this book, we have our own chance to "read the entire Goldstone Report, front to back," read intelligent commentary on it, come to our own conclusions, and act accordingly.

Detailed, but the final proof of war crimes by Israel's army. First class analysis of the facts. A must for anyone who wants to know what really happened in Gaza.

This is a scathing report that shows quite openly just how brutal the occupation and IDF is. It is essential that it be read and properly discussed so that we as Americans can begin to have proper dialogue on our connection with Israel. Adam Horowitz, who runs the blog Mondoweiss (an absolute must), and Lizzi Ratner have done an amazing job in compiling their data.

However, I would not stop here. There are a plethora of books to read in order to understand the historical basis of this conflict: Benny Morris "Righteoys Victims" and "Making Israel", Ilan Pappe "The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine", Noam Chomsky " Fateful Triangle: The United States, Israel and the Palestinians" and "Gaza In Crisis", Tom Segev "1967: Israel, the War, and the Year that Transformed the Middle East", Jonathan Cook "Disappearing Palestine", Avi Shalim "Israel and Palestine", and a host of literature available from Robert Fisk (particularly "Pity the Nation", an revealing book on the brutality of the IDF during their occupation of Lebanon).

The Israeli government vociferously condemned the Goldstone Report as biased, yet Israel refused to participate in the initial investigation and provided no input nor defense of Israeli army actions against Gaza. The report was also denounced as lies by many Israeli spokesmen. It is very clear from the Goldstone report that the lives and safety of Palestinian civilians in Gaza was of little consequence to the Israeli army. More than 1,200 innocent Palestinian men, women and children died as a result of Israeli bombardments and other actions in Gaza. I certainly don't defend the crimes, reckless provocations and murder of innocent Israelis by Hamas rockets; nonetheless, it is evident from this report that there were Israeli war crimes committed in Gaza as well. Only the U.S. and Israel seem blind to this fact. Israel has a right to defend itself, but it does not have a right to murder innocent civilians while using disproportionate force in densely populated civilian areas. Israel's liberal use of white phosphorus in Gaza was also a violation of international law.

This is not the first time that Israel used disproportionate force in civilian areas. Israel also killed many innocent civilians in the Lebanon conflict a few years ago. Many of the U.S. supplied cluster bombs dropped by Israel in Lebanon continue to harm and kill Lebanese civilians to this day.

One of the events outlined in the Report described the Israeli sniper shooting of Palestinian women holding white flags, including a pregnant Palestinian woman. One of the Israeli snipers eventually did face reduced charges, but he was not charged with murder.

In April, 2011 Justice Goldstone stated that the Israeli government did not deliberately target Gaza civilians during the conflict, and they investigated some of the alleged human rights violations. He also noted that Hamas has conducted no investigations of their forces targeting civilians. Even though Israel did not in most cases target civilians specifically, they continued to fire in densely populated civilian areas in Gaza, leading to the deaths of hundreds of Palestinian civilians. It is of little consolation to Palestinian families that their dead loved ones were not deliberately targeted by the Israeli army.

As long as the U.S. government provides unconditional support to Israel regardless of their often reckless actions, Israel will likely continue its agressive retaliatory policies leading to needless death and injury of innocent Palestinian civilians. There is little doubt that Israel's unjust and illegal occupation policies in the Palestinian Territories are the root cause of the violence in the region.

The Goldstone report was not a legal mandate or predicated on concrete evidence. It was a prejudged "fact-finding" mission. And by prejudged, I mean the original authors declared Israel's guilt before any "fact-finding" mission took place.

For some anti-Israelis, this is seen as a requirement to maintain street cred in the Arabist movement. But realistically in proves nothing.

Rhetoric, rhetoric - buzzwords such as genocide, war crimes, apartheid, etc - used frequently and not particularly impressive.

Having read the 500+ goldstone report numerous times, and analysis from international scholars and military experts - it is clear the "findings" in the Goldstone report were largely based on false testimony, anonymous witness, and very little evidence or proof.

The report was neither a landmark or a legacy. It was sponsored by the United Nations Human Rights Council - an organization originally chaired by LIBYA, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and many other Arab/Muslim states with stellar human rights history - this alone severely undermines the credibility of any investigation related to the sub-UN agency.

And since Goldstone has officially disowned the report, and the United Nations have accepted Israel's formal response six months ago without challenge, it is quite obvious this "land mark" investigation was nothing but a show.

Israel's performance in Gaza was nothing less than spectacular as far as counter-terrorism is confirmed. Israel devoted an incredible amount of energy and resources the military placed in minimizing "collateral damage" as Hamas did everything they could to maximize damage, including hiding weapons under hospitals and firing rockets from populated areas and even religious sites.

None of the authors are real impartial scholars. Weiss is a notorious anti-Zionist, a fringe figure. What is sad about this book is that it doesn't further justice or human rights.

It is merely exploits the conflict to sell an image that does not exist. An image that drives millions of foreigners angry.

It is a sad industry.