UN names Gaza probe panel, headed by harsh Israel critic/ Haaretz

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

Good. I'm glad to see the UN getting involved.

http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/israel-gaza-conflict-2014/.premium-1.610046

The United Nations Human Rights Council last night named the three members of the international commission of inquiry to investigate possible war crimes by Israel during Operation Protective Edge. A senior official in the Foreign Ministry said that despite Israel’s attempts to influence the composition of the panel, the final outcome is unbalanced and problematic.

The three-member panel will be chaired by Prof. William Schabas, a Canadian expert on international law whose academic focus has been on genocide. He is known to be highly critical of Israel and harshly attacked Operation Cast Lead at the time (2008-09). He praised the report issued by the Goldstone Committee following that operation, and said the commission’s chairman, Richard Goldstone, should be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Schabas has called in the past for the International Criminal Court in The Hague to put Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former President Shimon Peres on trial. Last year, at a conference in New York, Schabas said: “My favorite would be Netanyahu within the dock of the International Criminal Court.” A few years earlier, he said that if there was an indictment in the ICC against the president of Sudan for genocide, why should a similar indictment not be issued against the Israeli president for events in Gaza.

Also on the committee is the Lebanese-born British lawyer Amal Alamuddin, who was the legal adviser to the prosecutor during the special international tribunal convened by the UN following the 2005 assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Alamuddin may face accusations of bias because of her background: In 1982, when she was 4, her family fled Beirut in a U.S. ship while Israel was bombarding the city. She is engaged to actor George Clooney. The third member of the committee is Doudou Diène, an expert on human rights from Senegal who was the UN special envoy on racism and racial discrimination from 2011-14.

[COLGATE4]

1. Nothing says fair and impartial justice

like a panel where 2 of the 3 members are biased against one of the two parties.

[totodeinhere]

8. It's obvious that the council wants a certain result and that's why they chose

those three. With the obvious bias on the commission it will be easy for Israel to dismiss any of their findings.

[Bettie]

10. Israel would dismiss any findings that

put them in anything but the role of innocent victim anyway.

It doesn't matter who is on the committee, in the end, no matter what the findings are, Israel will declare their absolute innocence and further declare that all of Gaza is filled with terrorists, many of whom are small children.

Nothing changes. Ever.

[oberliner]

2. Unwise choice

Their findings would be so much more powerful if they had made a different one.

[bravenak]

3. Great choices!

I think this may do some good.

[riverwalker]

4. excellent commission

led by an excellent man, Prof. William Schabas.

[BillZBubb]

5. It wouldn't matter who the UN appointed, Israel was going to attack them.

Anyone with that much expertise in International Law and Genocide is by definition going to be a critic of past Israeli outrages. The issue is not who is on the commission but the facts they find and report.

As always, Israel will make it nearly impossible for the commission to investigate anything.

[totodeinhere]

6. I don't think it will make any difference what the commission finds. Israel's friends

will protect her. I see the chance of Bibi being put on trail for war crimes as about the same as Bush going on trial. It won't happen.

[iandhr]

7. But nothing about Hamas?

THE UN is a joke

China, The Congo, Russia Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates are just a sampling of the dictatorships with an atrocious human rights record that are on the "Human rights council."

[Jefferson23]

9. Wikileaks: Ban Ki-Moon Worked with Israel to Undermine UN Report

Published 9 August 2014


The General Secretary of United Nations (UN) Ban Ki-Moon collaborated in secret with Israel and the United States to weaken the effects of a Board of Inquiry's report accusing Israel of human rights violations in Gaza in Dec. 2008 – Jan. 2009.

Wikileaks released documents on Friday that revealed that Ban wrote a letter to the UN Security Council asking its members not to take recommendations by the UN Board of Inquiry about Israeli bombings in Gaza into account.

The report demonstrated that the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) had a direct role in seven of the nine attacks against buildings of the UN in Gaza strip, and accused Israel of having breached the inviolability and immunity of UN premises.



http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Wikileaks-Ban-Ki-Moon-Worked-with-Israel-to-Undermine-UN-Report-20140809-0020.html