Israel Matzav

Hamas: Goldstone doesn't single us out (they're right too)

Hamas spokesman Mussa Abu-Marzuq tried to spread the blame around all 'Palestinian' factions on Tuesday for the few 'war crimes' attributed to it by the Goldstone Commission Report. This is truly special:

Hamas is preparing a committee to investigate allegations that prisoners under de facto police control were shot and imprisoned during Israel’s war on Gaza, member of the party’s politbureau said Tuesday.

Speaking on Al-Arabiya, Moussa Abu Marzouq reiterated the party’s stance on the UN-mandated Goldstone report, which says there is evidence of war crimes in the actions of Israel and Gaza factions during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in December and January.

“It was all Palestinian factions who launched projectiles,” Abu Marzouq said, “including Fatah,” indicating that the report does not single out Hamas.

As for allegations in the Goldstone report, earlier brought to light in media reports and documents from the Palestinian Authority following the war, that Hamas fighters and possibly de facto government police had injured prisoners, mainly Fatah affiliates, who were in their care during the war, Abu Marzouq said a committee was being formed to investigate.

I'm sure that 'committee' will do at least as good a job as Goldstone did.

I'm sure they'll ignore this since it happened after the cease fire went into effect. But maybe Human Rights Watch can show them this report.

But you know what? Hamas is right. The report does not single them out.

Here's more:

Why aren’t Hamas leaders worried by the report? The reason can be found in a speech Ismail Haniyeh made on October 14, 2009 to Palestinians wounded during the war. He said, “We bless the committee, we gave it everything it needed to investigate, as well as documents which helped publish it in its present form. Occasional comments here and there about the resistance (sic) and the right of the Palestinian people to defend itself do not mean that we do not support the Report.”

In effect, he dismissed out of hand everything the report said about terrorist attacks and firing rockets into Israel, considering it lip service paid by the Committee and without practical importance for Hamas.

Reading the Goldstone Report shows that Ismail Haniyeh’s interpretation was correct. The Hamas de-facto administration and its leaders are never accused of responsibility for terrorism and firing rockets. Rather, nebulous “Palestinian armed groups” are responsible. The theme is repeated in the report’s few references to Palestinian terrorism. For example, Paragraph 1747, page 541, reads “In relation to the firing of rockets and mortars into Southern Israel by Palestinian armed groups operating in the Gaza Strip, the Mission finds that the Palestinian armed groups fail to distinguish between military targets and the civilian population and civilian objects in Southern Israel. The launching of rockets and mortars which cannot be aimed with sufficient precisions at military targets breaches the fundamental principle of distinction. Where there is no intended military target and the rockets and mortars are launched into civilian areas, they constitute a deliberate attack against the civilian population. These actions would constitute war crimes and may amount to crimes against humanity.”

That's right folks. In Goldstone's world, it wasn't Hamas that was responsible, it was a bunch of anonymous, nebulous 'Palestinian armed groups.'

Read the whole thing.

The picture is a 'collaborator' on trial in a Hamas 'courtroom.'

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:55 PM