UNDERSTANDING
THE GOLDSTONE REPORT

The most extensive, detailed, and documented survey of Hamas' use of civilians as human shields and associated violations of the laws of war that endanger civilians. Published by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on July 29, 2009, and submitted to the Goldstone Mission. They refer to it a number of times, always to reject its claims.

THE OPERATION IN GAZA: FACTUAL AND LEGAL ASPECTS

29 Jul 2009

V. THE USE OF FORCE - Hamas’ Breaches of the Law of Armed Conflict

B.Hamas’ Breaches of the Law of Armed Conflict and War Crimes

142. Both prior to and during the IDF operation in Gaza, Hamas flouted the Law of Armed Conflict, terrorising Israeli citizens through an endless barrage of rocket and mortar attacks, and deliberately using Palestinian civilians, as well as protected U.N., educational, medical, administrative (so-called governmental) and religious facilities, as a cover for its operations.  In adopting such methods of warfare, members of Hamas committed internationally recognised war crimes, and made it impossible for the IDF to avoid collateral damage to civilians and civilian objectives in pursuit of legitimate military objectives during the operation.

143. As the evidence discussed below illustrates, the tactics and modus operandi of Hamas and other terrorist organisations offend the most fundamental legal and moral norms of human behaviour.

144. While the examples of Hamas’ violations of the Law of Armed Conflict cited in this report are far from exhaustive, they illustrate the extraordinary challenges that the tactics of Hamas posed for the IDF, as a military force committed to respecting its obligations under international law.  As explained below, Hamas has violated a myriad of basic norms of International Humanitarian Law.

Israeli Population Centres

145. As described in Section IV.B above, for many years Hamas engaged in deliberate, systematic and widespread use of rocket attacks, mortar attacks and suicide bombings intentionally directed at civilian targets in Israel.(139)  The international community, including the United Nations, the Quartet of Middle East mediators,(140) the European Union,(141) the United States,(142) the United Kingdom (143) and many other States and international bodies, have condemned Hamas’ rocket attacks.

146. Hamas’ rocket attacks directed at Israel’s civilian population centres deliberately violated the basic principles of distinction.(144)  Any doubt about this is resolved by the fact that Hamas itself has boasted of its intention to hit population centres.  It is well accepted in customary international law that “[i]ntentionally directing attacks against the civilian population as such or against individual civilians not taking part in hostilities” constitutes a war crime.(145)

147. In this case, numerous international observers have recognised that Hamas was intentionally engaging in deliberate attacks, in violation of the Law of Armed Conflict.  Even well before the escalation of rocket attacks in 2008, the United Nations Under-Secretary General for Political Affairs condemned Hamas rocket fire on Sderot as “legally and morally wrong.”(146)  The United Nations Under-Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs stated that “there’s no justification” under the law for the firing of the rockets, because “[t]hey are indiscriminate, there’s no military target.”(147) And the U.N. Secretary-General confirmed his view that the rocket attacks in Israel were “targeting and injuring civilians.”(148)

148. Hamas deliberately targets rockets and mortar rounds at Israeli population centres and specifically intends to cause the maximum amount of civilian death and suffering.  Hamas cheers when one of its rockets or mortars succeeds in hitting a civilian target, whether that be a private home or public institution.  For instance, the following Hamas poster boasts of homes destroyed by missiles in Southern Israel:

Hamas poster depicting Israeli civilian homes destroyed by rocket fire

149. It is therefore clear that the purpose of Hamas’ incessant rocket attacks on Israel’s southern towns and cities, in addition to causing death, injury and destruction, is to spread terror among Israel’s civilian population.  This also constitutes a serious violation of the Law of Armed Conflict.  As discussed above, it is a core principle of customary international law that:

From Israel Matzav

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Video: Hamas terrorist uses children as human shields

Here's another video I don't recall seeing before. Maybe that's why Goldstone missed it.

In this IAF aerial footage taken during the Cast Lead Operation in January 2009, a Hamas terrorist fires a rocket from the roof of a house, he then calls to a group of children accompanied by an adult to come to the entrance of the house to escort him out. This is yet another example of how Hamas deliberately exploits civilians to provide cover for their terrorist activities.

From Israel Matzav

September 15, 2009

The Goldstone Commission on human shields: Lies and damned lies

I mentioned earlier that the Goldstone Commission report is 574 pages long. I have it sitting open on my computer, but finding the time to read it in its entirety... isn't likely to happen anytime soon. So I thought I would do some searching to try to give you the flavor. I searched for the term "human shield."

What I was looking for was the use of the 'Palestinian' civilian population by Hamas as human shields. It's basically not there. Here's what they have to say about it:

474. The Mission’s attention has been drawn to a well-known incident in which women and children followed calls to gather on the roof of the house of a Palestinian man who had been informed by the Israeli authorities that his house would be targeted. This incident has been documented in video footage in the public domain and is referred to in submissions received by the Mission as evidence of the use of human shields. The Mission notes, however, that the incident occurred in 2007. No such incidents are alleged by the Israeli Government with regard to the military operations that began on 27 December 2008. The Mission received no reports of such incidents from other sources. On the contrary, in one case investigated by the Mission, a Hamas official received a phone call from the Israeli armed forces to the effect that his house would soon be targeted. He evacuated the house with his family and alerted the neighbours to the imminent threat so that they, too, were able to leave their homes before the missile did indeed strike.

Let's go to the videotape. January 8, 2009.

Goldstone Report inaccuracies, part 19

The Goldstone Report talks about, and dismisses, Israeli accusations that Hamas used ambulances for military purposes. The entire section is very revealing as to the bias that the Commission had when investigating claims against Hamas. Here it is in its entirety:

2. Ambulances
470. The Government of Israel alleges that “Hamas made particular use of ambulances, which frequently served as an escape route out of a heated battle with IDF forces.”326 471. The Mission investigated cases in which ambulances were denied access to wounded Palestinians. Three cases in particular are described in chapter XI: the attempts of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) to evacuate the wounded from the al-Samouni neighbourhood south of Gaza City after the attack on the house of Ateya al-Samouni and after the shelling of the house of Wa’el al-Samouni; the attempt of an ambulance driver to rescue the daughters of Khalid and Kawthar Abd Rabbo in Izbat Abd Rabbo; and the attempt of an ambulance driver to evacuate Rouhiyah al-Najjar after she had been hit by an Israeli sniper. In all three cases the Mission found, on the facts it gathered, that the Israeli armed forces must have known that there were no combatants among the people to be rescued or in the immediate vicinity.

Why is this paragraph here? The section is meant to discuss possible Hamas war crimes, but before Goldstone even starts looking at any evidence, he puts in this utterly irrelevant paragraph about alleged Israeli war crimes, whose only tangential relevance is the word "ambulances." The entire section this is under is called "VIII. OBLIGATION ON PALESTINIAN ARMED GROUPS IN GAZA TO TAKE FEASIBLE PRECAUTIONS TO PROTECT THE CIVILIAN POPULATION."

Before Goldstone even entertains the possibility of Hamas war crimes in context of ambulances, he feels compelled to throw in an unrelated dig at the IDF that he already covered at length elsewhere in the report. Is this supposed to be "unbiased?"

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On the basis of the investigations it has conducted, the Mission did not find any evidence to support the allegations that hospital facilities were used by the Gaza authorities or by Palestinian armed groups to shield military activities and that ambulances were used to transport combatants or for other military purposes.

The following in part of a Memorandum that Maurice Ostroff submitted to the UNHRC on the Goldstone Report. In it he details the evidence for Hamas' use of human shields, their use of mosques, ambulances and hospitals for military activity, their hiding within a civilian population as civilians (perfidy), 

4.1. Human shields (See Appendix D)

The Report downplayed and in some cases ignored readily available evidence of the use by Palestinians of their own civilians as human shields, such as the many Reports that have been published over the years documenting the common practice of using human shields by the Palestinians.

See http://www.geocities.com/palestiniansarelies/HumanShields.html

In the face of a public statement by Hamas member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, Mr. Fathi Hammad, that Hamas created a human shield of women, children, the elderly and the mujahideen the Mission acts as his defending counsel. The Report states, "Although the Mission finds this statement morally repugnant, it does not consider it to constitute evidence that Hamas forced Palestinian civilians to shield military objectives against attack"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLFAJK5LtwY.