Where is Goldstone now?

[bbsh]

Where is Goldstone now?



Why is world silent in wake of killing of innocent civilians in Afghanistan?

Eitan Haber
Published: 02.24.10, 18:22 / Israel Opinion

Here are the dry numbers (after all the tears have dried up): Earlier this week, NATO forces hit several vehicles in Afghanistan and killed 27 innocent Afghanis, including four women and a child.


And a reminder to those who forgot: A short while ago, 13 other innocent Afghanis were killed after a missile mistakenly targeted a residential home instead of a Taliban position.

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Let there be no misunderstandings about it: Even though I am writing this thousands of kilometers away from the scene of these incidents, and even though we are talking about anonymous families in a foreign and hostile country, one is pained by the loss of life and by the sudden death of people who wanted to live, love, build a home and plant a tree. In this respect, our tears are real; tears are similar in every corner of the world.

But now, after all of the above had been said, we a have a small question; a tiny question, a minor one, something wholly insignificant: Where are you, Goldstone?

Here is an unintelligent guess: The world that cries out and weeps for every scratch suffered by a Palestinian child (and we are opposed to even such scratch,) the same world that portrays the State of Israel every morning (in newspapers) and every night (on TV) as the killer and butcher of children and as a state that fires into homes only to find bleeding bodies later on, that world will be silent, or at most offer some lip service in respect to the incident described above.

World overcome by paralysis

Instead, the BBC will suddenly suffer constipation that would halt its chatter, the New York Times will go blind for a day or two, leftists at Berkeley will happen to be away on vacation, and the professors at Oxford and Cambridge will be spending the next few days playing cricket.

And so, the world is silent and will keep silent. It has good and justified reasons for this silence: After all, these are not Jews who fire at Palestinian babies; it is not Israel defending the lives of its children.

And on a final note: No one should misunderstand, heaven forbid, and take the above words to mean that we endorse misguided lethal fire. We are merely opposed to the hypocrisy of the world, which is suddenly overcome by paralysis. And if we were wrong, and the world will soon raise a hue and cry about the deaths in Afghanistan, we shall ask for its forgiveness. We are allowed to make such mistake, for that first time.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3853821,00.html

[dracon49]

Goldstone is a pro Israeli you don't remember that? he only worries for Israel...:) LOL

[bbsh]

Marjah, Gaza & Judge Goldstone

Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Afghan President Hamid Karzai: "NATO Forces Are Still Killing Too Many Innocent Civilians In Current Marjah Offensive Against Taliban Guerrillas"

U.S. & Afghan Officers: "Taliban Is Fighting From Behind Civilians Using Them As Human Shields"

Senior U.S. Officer: "Civilian Casualties Are Inevitable In Such Warfare"
Judge Goldstone

NATO forces waging the current campaign are discovering that Taliban forces in the Marjah region of Afghanistan are copying the Hamas tactics against the Israel Defense Forces in Gaza. The Islamist guerillas in Marjah are also exploiting innocent civilians as ' human shields' with some of them being killed and wounded in the cross-fire. U.S. Brig. Gen. Nicholson has been quoted as saying that despite precautions such casualties are inevitable. Ironically, Judge Richard Goldstone who accused the Israel Defense Forces of being guilty of war crimes and possibly 'crimes against humanity' in Gaza has said that the IDF should 'follow the example of the U.S. Forces fighting in Iraq and elsewhere. David Essing urges Judge Goldstone to 'join the dots' between the NATO warfare in Afghanistan and the IDF's 'Cast Lead' operation into Gaza to suppress the the rocketing of Israeli civilians.

First before drawing any comparison between the Israel Defense Forces war in Gaza and NATO's current anti-guerrilla campaign in the Marjah region of Afghanistan, it is useful to look at some of the news dispatches from the battle zone.

AP-Feb21st: A NATO airstrike is southern Afghanistan has killed at least 21 civilians , the Afghan interior ministry said today. NATO forces confirmed in a statement that its planes fired on a group of vehicles that it believed contained insurgents who were about to attack its forces, only to discover that women and children were in the cars. NATO did not provide a figure of how many died or say if all those in the vehicles were civilians. The strike hit three minibuses that were driving down a major road in the mountainous province . There were 42 people in the vehicles, all civilians. Investigators on the ground have collected 21 bodies and two people are missing .
IDF troops near the Gaza Strip

"We are extremely saddened by the tragic loss of innocent lives" NATO commander General Stanley McChrystal said in a statement ......

AP-Feb16th: Three more Afghan civilians have been killed in the assault on a southern Taliban stronghold, NATO forces said Tuesday, highlighting the toll of the population from an offensive aimed at making them safer. The deaths- in three- separate incidents - come after two errant U.S. missiles struck a house on the outskirts of the town of Marjah on Sunday, killing twelve people, half of them children. Afghan officials said Monday that three Taliban fighters were in the house at the time of the attack.

In two of the most recently reported incidents, Afghan men came toward NATO forces and ignored shouts and hand signals to stop, NATO said. The troops shot the men and killed them.

In the third incident, two Afghan men were caught in the crossfire between insurgents and NATO forces. Both men were wounded and one died of his injuries despite being given medical care, NATO said.

USA Today- Feb.19th: The Taliban is using civilians and hundreds of explosives to try and prevent Afghan and U.S. troops from taking over the jihadist group's largest stronghold in Afghanistan, the Afghan Army said Wednesday.

Afgan. Brig. Gen. Moheedin Ghori: "The Taliban is trying to goad troops into endangering civilians lives". He said Taliban fighters have put women and children on rooftops and fired from behind them.

"They are trying to get us to fire on them" said Ghori, who said the Taliban's strategy has slowed the advance.

Lt.Col. Jeff Rule, a U.S. Marine operations officer, said he received multiple reports of Taliban fighters not letting people leave their homes.

"They will use people as human shields|," he said.

"Civilians were hit," said Esmatullah, an Afgan soldier -"troops would fire when fired upon and later discover that civilians were shot in the crossfire".

Even before the current offensive in Marjah, Afghan President Hamid Karzai repeatedly complained that his allies, the NATO forces, were killing too many Afghan civilians.

Clearly this type of counter- terrorism operation, be it in Marjah or Gaza, will inadvertently take its toll in civilian casualties, that is the guerrilla strategy. In fact, the reports from Afghanistan are a carbon copy of what the Israel Defense Forces faced when they entered Gaza to suppress the Hamas rocketing of Israeli civilians. Today, the Taliban are also cynically exploiting civilians in the same way Hamas does in Gaza. However, even Judge Goldstone could not refer to an Israeli air strike that attacked three minibuses. On the contrary, the Israeli Air Force even developed a new, small charge that was dropped on the roofs of Palestinian buildings as a warning to residents to immediately evacuate, before the IDF moved in on Hamas targets. The explosive made a big boom but caused no damage. It became known as ' knock on the roof ' rather than 'knock on the door'. (This in addition to dropping hundreds of thousands of leaflets and telephone calls warning civilians to leave.) The NATO commander, U.S. General Stanley McChrsytal has repeatedly apologized for the civilian casualties and there is no doubt his forces are trying not to inflict civilian casualties, although it is fair to say they take fewer precautions than did the IDF. (In an incident several weeks ago, the Taliban hijacked a fuel tanker-truck in the vicinity of German troops. The German officer, fearful that the tanker would be detonated among his men, requested and got an air strike on the tanker. It killed some 90 people, mostly civilians who were siphoning off the fuel from the vehicle.).

The UN's Human Rights Commission, a notorious body set up by the pro-Arab bloc for vilifying the Jewish state, lost no time in producing the Goldstone report condemning Israel. Now more than ever, it is clear for anyone who is ready to see, the Goldstone allegations against Israel in Gaza compared with NATO's conduct of the war in Marjah, screams to high heaven! One thing is certain - there will be no UN inquires into Iraq or Afghanistan nor Chechnya nor Tibet for that matter. Everyone, not only Judge Goldstone, can draw his or her own conclusions.

http://www.isracast.com/article.aspx?ID=1187&t=Marjah-Gaza-&-Judge-Goldstone

[CMNot]

This guy wants comparisons?

So, some 40 civvies killed in the past few weeks on Herrick. And if we take the IDF figures as golden, they managed to slot/explode/incinerate 250+ in just three weeks.

1-0 Israel, for sure.


Let there be no misunderstandings about it: Even though I am writing this thousands of kilometers away from the scene of these incidents, and even though we are talking about anonymous families in a foreign and hostile country, one is pained by the loss of life and by the sudden death of people who wanted to live, love, build a home and plant a tree. In this respect, our tears are real; tears are similar in every corner of the world

Christ, the sanctimonious **** damn near made me choke on my own vomit comet.

[Fat Lazy American]

This guy wants comparisons?

So, some 40 civvies killed in the past few weeks on Herrick. And if we take the IDF figures as golden, they managed to slot/explode/incinerate 250+ in just three weeks.

1-0 Israel, for sure.



Christ, the sanctimonious **** damn near made me choke on my own vomit comet.

The US, the UK and their allies were "responsible" for more civilian deaths in the first two weeks of the Iraq War than Israel has been for the last 50 years of Arab-Israeli wars.

[Hollis]

The US, the UK and their allies were "responsible" for more civilian deaths in the first two weeks of the Iraq War than Israel has been for the last 50 years of Arab-Israeli wars.

Ever thought one can say US, the UK and Israel are blame for the civilians deaths but in reality, it was saddam and the terrorist that cause those action to be taken. In the US court of Law, two robbers go in a bank and find themselves in a shoot out with police. One robber was killed by the Police. The other robber was capture. The captured robber could/would be charged for the murder of the dead robber. If a citizen was also killed in the cross fire by either the robbers or police, any serving robber would be charged with that person's murder.

So yes, lets get baited and flame each other for the actions of a mad man and terrorists.

[Fat Lazy American]

Ever thought one can say US, the UK and Israel are blame for the civilians deaths but in reality, it was saddam and the terrorist that cause those action to be taken. In the US court of Law, two robbers go in a bank and find themselves in a shoot out with police. One robber was killed by the Police. The other robber was capture. The captured robber could/would be charged for the murder of the dead robber. If a citizen was also killed in the cross fire by either the robbers or police, any serving robber would be charged with that person's murder.

So yes, lets get baited and flame each other for the actions of a mad man and terrorists.

I put "responsible" in quotes for a reason. I was just responding to CMN's absurd comparison of figures.

I'm fully comfortable the U.S. and British militaries and their allies generally complied with the laws of war during the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq -- the same is true with Israeli operations in Gaza, Lebanon, etc.

[bbsh]

This guy wants comparisons?

So, some 40 civvies killed in the past few weeks on Herrick. And if we take the IDF figures as golden, they managed to slot/explode/incinerate 250+ in just three weeks.

1-0 Israel, for sure.


You missed the point of the article, which is not to make a comparison of which country is in fact killing least ammount of civilians

The point was to highlight the differences in how NGO's and the international community in general deal with Israel vis a vis other countries.

The author of these articles is not pointing the finger at american and british troops claiming genocide, war crimes or any other absurd claims.

Although the example of afghanistan is being used, i believe its only because its a current event.. More fitting would be maybe the war in Sri Lanka which took place around the same time as Cast Lead, affected many more civilians and hardly got any attention what so ever.

Just out of curiosity though and only because you brought up the numbers in comparison to each other; What is the number of civilians killed that when surpassed becomes unacceptable? Is it that those 40 civilians dont count and dont deserve any sort of 'attention' from NGO's because there are so very 'little' of them? Should their families be comforted in any way because the civilian death toll isnt up to par with conflicts like the one in Gaza?

[kamaz]

Israel is the Jew of the nations. This is dead obvious to anyone that looks at the hundreds of resolutions, 'fact finding' missions and global condemnation anytime IDF initiates counter terrorist action in the territories. Its a running circus.

[CMNot]

You missed the point of the article, which is not to make a comparison of which country is in fact killing least ammount of civilians

All we ever here in the UK is negative coverage of Afghan, and Iraq before that. Our Gov't and press is STILL trying to crucify a (now ex) Army Colonel because some of his soldiers hit some Iraqis. 'War crimes' and all that. You think the coverage of Cast Lead is negative, you should have seen the press over here when 'Phatom Fury' kicked off. Little old me sat in front of my TV eating my Freedom Fries screaming "YEAAAH" whilst some sullen, ashen faced, sanctimonious twitters on about how "EVERYONE IS DIEING". Blah blah.

Just because Haaretz or whoever is not covering it because it doesn't involve Jewish persecution, doesn't mean the media aren't bitching and moaning about baby killing British soldiers. It would be a lot worse, but for some odd reason the British public have now (300 years late) taken the squaddy to their hearts and the media and Gov't have to tread very lightly.


Just out of curiosity though and only because you brought up the numbers in comparison to each other; What is the number of civilians killed that when surpassed becomes unacceptable?

Honestly?

I couldn't give three flying ****s about little Jimmy Akhbar and his seven sisters getting JDAM'd into the middle of next week. It is utterly irrelevant to me. They are not my tribe, and I cannot relate to them. Whether they live or die, come morning my coffee will still taste good, the air will still have the sweet smell of faux freedom, and the road to work will still be jammed at 8:47 exactly. Hell, it's probably 400 people who won't have the chance to dance around burning American/British/Danish flags.

But the infatuation with the Goldstone report and the injustice of the world is zzzzzz. The report formed a 3 minute segment of a news broadcast for one day, and was even then the end note to the important days news: whose had their **** in Britneys mouth today? Those who care either have their minds made up already and for whom it is just more reinforcement that the evil juice is in fact, evil, or they are capable of research, reason and forming their own opinion. The world hates Israel, and America, and it's not exactly rosy being British.

[dracon49]

When you have automatically a majority of muslim and non alliance countries, you don't have any say in the UN unless you are a member in the UNSC...and we need to be honest-will have many more Goldstones...and i prefer that then allowing terrorists to attack us without responding(thats what Goldstone would like-that will do nothing against terrorists).

[GB_FXST]

Two wrongs do not make a right.

It was wrong for the UNCHR and Goldstone to investigate alleged isareli war crimes. it would also be wrong for the UNCHR to investigate alleged US war crimes in Afghanistan or Iraq.

However, the failure to apply the same standard to other countries does serve as another example of the UNCHR's obsession with Israel and moral bankruptcy.

[CMNot]

In grudging fairness to them, the UNHCR can't go anywhere near Helmand province.

[Cabalabro]

Guys maybe everything is alot simpler. That goldstone report and all that. I think that UN ware kinda pissed when israel bombed their schools and hospitals during cast leed. So they thought like. Hey lets do a goldstone report and maybe Israel will think twice before bombing United Nations girl's school. So to answer the question of this topic. Maybe UN doesnt do any condeming reports on iraq and afganistanl cuz coalition simply avoid bombing UN buildings?

[MichaelF]

Israel is the Jew of the nations.


http://www.bolgernow.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/master-of-the-obvious.jpg


.......................

[bbsh]

NGO: UNHRC gives impunity to violators
By E.B. SOLOMONT, JERUSALEM POST CORRESPONDENT
26/02/2010
Council ignored China, Cuba, Libya, & N. Korea, while slamming Israel 27 times.

WASHINGTON – In the past year, the UN Human Rights Council passed a resolution praising Sri Lanka, took no action on Iran and passed 18 resolutions counterproductive to human rights, a report by the watchdog group UN Watch has charged.

Envisioning a more robust role for the United States, which joined the council last year, the Geneva-based NGO analyzed 30 key resolutions and found that only 13 of 47 council members voted “positively,” that is for resolutions advancing human rights. At the same time, the report alleged, the council ignored 18 of the worst violators, including China, Cuba, Libya and North Korea, and it slammed Israel with 27 out of 33 of its country-specific resolutions.

The report also found that more than half of current members – 24 out of 47 – fail to meet basic standards of democracy, according to the Freedom House annual survey.

“The UN’s main human rights body has turned into the world’s leading sponsor of impunity for gross abuses worldwide,” said Hillel Neuer, UN Watch’s executive director, visiting Washington to present the group’s 2010 scorecard and report. On Wednesday, he joined New York Congressman Eliot Engel and Florida Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen at a Capitol Hill briefing in which he urged the US to hold the Human Rights Council more accountable.

The UN Watch document mentioned the Goldstone Report, since the Gaza fact-finding mission was mandated by the council, but did not focus on it.

“It very much fits into a pattern and practice,” Neuer said. He said members of the fact-finding mission – including Christine Chikin and Desmond Travers – made public statements about Israel’s culpability before their investigation began. “The council knew what it was getting” and was committed to a “preconceived outcome,” Neuer said.

With the council set to open its 13th session on March 1, Neuer envisioned a role for the US in which it would “speak out” against impunity. For example, Iran is vying for a seat on the council. “There is great concern that in the upcoming elections in May, Iran is a candidate,” Neuer said.

The UN Watch report also describes the council’s inaction regarding 12 examples of gross human rights violations. They include a lack of council action on media censorship in Belarus, extrajudicial killings and forced labor in Myanmar and longstanding censorship in China. The council took no action when it came to Iran, where the June 2009 election prompted widespread protests and arrests, including reports of point-blank shootings, prison abuse and rape.

“Unfortunately, what we’ve seen in the last decade and longer is the politicization of the Commission on Human Rights and now [its replacement], the Human Rights Council,” UN Watch chairman Alfred Moses, a former ambassador to Romania in the Clinton administration, told reporters on Tuesday.

Based on 30 council votes in the past year, UN Watch scored each member state’s position, awarding one point for voting positively and subtracting a point for a “negative” vote, or a vote counterproductive to human rights.

Thirteen of the 47 countries scored positively, which Neuer called “the reality of the council today.”

Canada came out on top, with 23 points, followed by Germany, Italy and the Netherlands with 18.

On the negative side, 34 countries cast ballots in support of repressive regimes. Egypt and China scored the worst, at -20, edging out other offenders – Cuba, Djibouti, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Qatar and South Africa – which earned -19 points. Saudi Arabia and Russia each scored -18, while Jordan came out with -16. The United States was not ranked because it only joined the council last June.

South Africa scored poorly because it votes with old regional blocs, Neuer said.

The UN Watch report outlined concrete steps for the US to take to hold the worst violators accountable, including taking the council floor more often with resolutions and denunciations. The US should demand accountability, introduce country-specific resolutions, convene special sessions to address gross human rights violations, and oppose impractical sessions, the report recommends.

Regarding Israel, the US should work to strike down the council’s Agenda Item No. 7, adopted in 2007 over the objections of Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, the EU and Canada, which permanently singles out Israel at every council session.

As for 27 of the 33 country-specific resolutions singling out Israel, “This is unacceptable,” Neuer said, adding that both Israel and the Palestinians should be held accountable for their human rights records in a “fair and balanced” manner.

But in devoting 80 percent of country-specific resolutions to criticize Israel, the council has ignored “real human rights abuses” committed by Cuba, China, Russia and Saudi Arabia, said Ros-Lehtinen. “The UN’s so-called ‘Human Rights Council’ has descended into a swamp of anti-American, anti-Israel, anti-freedom bias.”

http://www.jpost.com/LandedPages/PrintArticle.aspx?id=169743