The Goldstone Report: believe it if you like
The recently-published Goldstone report concerns Israel's Operation Cast Lead which the IDF mounted against Hamas in Gaza: it carries totally-predicable findings – and you can guess who are the bad guys. However one British army officer challenged the prejudice. And the room fell silent.
 The United Nations fact-finding mission examining Israel's Operation Cast Lead against Hamas in Gaza has been published.
Headed by South African Judge Richard Goldstone, the mission's 575-page report found that "Israel committed actions amounting to war crimes, possibly crimes against humanity."
However, the organisation UN Watch reports concerning some of the evidence given to the enquiry:
We invited as our speaker a man who repeatedly put his life on the line to defend the democratic world from the murderous Saddam Hussein, Al Qaeda, and the Taleban.
The moment he began his first sentence, the room fell silent. Judge Goldstone, author of the distorted report that prompted today's one-sided condemnation of Israel but not Hamas, had refused to hear Col. Kemp's testimony during his "fact-finding" hearings. [Emphasis added] But UN Watch made sure today that this hero's voice would be heard – at the U.N., and around the world
Have a look at the following video and judge whether or not what you read and see in the British media and in UN reports chime with it all.
Colonel Richard Kemp speaking to the UN 'Fact Finding' Mission on Gaza
“...supporters of Israel feel that it is harshly judged by standards that are not applied to its enemies, and too often this is true, particularly in some UN bodies.” Former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan at the opening of the 61st General Assembly on September 20, 2006.
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The transcript of what Colonel Richard Kemp said to the UN Human Rights Council's 12th Special Session on 16 October 2009 is as follows:
Thank you, Mr. President.
I am the former commander of the British forces in Afghanistan. I served with NATO and the United Nations; commanded troops in Northern Ireland, Bosnia and Macedonia; and participated in the Gulf War. I spent considerable time in Iraq since the 2003 invasion, and worked on international terrorism for the UK Government’s Joint Intelligence Committee.
Mr. President, based on my knowledge and experience, I can say this: During Operation Cast Lead, the Israeli Defence Forces did more to safeguard the rights of civilians in a combat zone than any other army in the history of warfare. [Emphasis added]
Israel did so while facing an enemy that deliberately positioned its military capability behind the human shield of the civilian population.
Hamas, like Hizballah, are expert at driving the media agenda. Both will always have people ready to give interviews condemning Israeli forces for war crimes. They are adept at staging and distorting incidents.
The IDF faces a challenge that we British do not have to face to the same extent. It is the automatic, Pavlovian presumption by many in the international media, and international human rights groups, that the IDF are in the wrong, that they are abusing human rights.
The truth is that the IDF took extraordinary measures to give Gaza civilians notice of targeted areas, dropping over 2 million leaflets, and making over 100,000 phone calls. Many missions that could have taken out Hamas military capability were aborted to prevent civilian casualties. During the conflict, the IDF allowed huge amounts of humanitarian aid into Gaza. To deliver aid virtually into your enemy's hands is, to the military tactician, normally quite unthinkable. But the IDF took on those risks.
Despite all of this, of course innocent civilians were killed. War is chaos and full of mistakes. There have been mistakes by the British, American and other forces in Afghanistan and in Iraq, many of which can be put down to human error. But mistakes are not war crimes.
More than anything, the civilian casualties were a consequence of Hamas’ way of fighting. Hamas deliberately tried to sacrifice their own civilians.
Mr. President, Israel had no choice apart from defending its people, to stop Hamas from attacking them with rockets.
And I say this again: the IDF did more to safeguard the rights of civilians in a combat zone than any other army in the history of warfare.
Thank you, Mr. President.
See also: Lies, d...n lies, and media headlines and -
DO BELIVE some of what you DON'T READ in the newspapers.
Meanwhile God's word on the situation:
On that day, when all the nations of the earth are gathered against her, I will make Jerusalem an immovable rock for all the nations. All who try to move it will injure themselves. Zech 12:3
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