Goldstone’s Mea Culpa and Israel’s Wars
On Friday, the Washington Post published Judge Richard Goldstone’s retraction of most of the Goldstone Report. Just two days earlier, the Post published Israeli military maps — apparently supplied by the Israeli army — of Hezbollah’s underground bunkers, arms caches, and command centers in southern Lebanon.
The two events’ proximity is a coincidence. Yet — despite the fact that the Goldstone Report dealt with Hamas in Gaza, not Hezbollah in Lebanon — it has a certain inadvertent logic.
The notorious Goldstone Report was published in September 2009, eight months after Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza, and charged Israel with a deliberate, systematic attack on civilians while whitewashing Hamas. In his op-ed on Friday, Goldstone reversed himself by admitting that “civilians were not intentionally targeted [by Israel] as a matter of policy.” He also implied that statistics furnished by Israel soon after the war — showing it had killed far more combatants than civilians — were accurate.
The fact remains that a significant number — about 300 — of Palestinian civilians were killed in the operation. At the time, Israel stressed that despite the best efforts of an army with high moral standards, this was largely unavoidable because of Hamas’s strategy of using the civilian population as human shields. The Goldstone Report contemptuously dismissed that claim despite extensive evidence, including graphic evidence, for it (here, here, and here, for instance).
This is where the IDF’s maps of Hezbollah’s underground facilities come in. They show an extensive network of these in populated areas, including some adjacent to schools and hospitals in the village of El-Khiam. As Jerusalem Post military analyst Yaakov Katz notes:
Israel is revealing the information as part of a public diplomacy campaign aimed at preparing the world for the widespread devastation that will likely occur in Lebanon if there should be a new Israeli war with Hezbollah, due to Hezbollah’s decision to station its assets inside populated villages.
In other words, Israel’s enemies — particularly the two terrorist outfits encamped on its borders, Hezbollah and Hamas — have learned their lessons well. As Israeli columnist Assaf Wohl pointed out this week in an open letter to Goldstone,
Hamas also probed your report in depth and is using it effectively. The group’s leaders realize that the report you drafted will tie Israel’s hands and prevent it from utilizing its full force against terrorists.
Like Hezbollah, Hamas knows that’s because the human-shields strategy works so well. Setting Israel up to inflict civilian casualties, then flashing these across the TV screens of the world, is a more effective weapon even than rockets and missiles because it can subject Israel to such fierce worldwide pressure as to stop its military efforts altogether.
Goldstone’s Washington Post retraction has stirred much excitement in Israel, despite awareness that it’s gotten little play elsewhere. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has asked the foreign, defense, and justice ministries to formulate plans to, as he put it, “reverse and minimize the great damage” the report has caused.
That damage is thought to include a heavy blow to Israel’s already-battered image, furthering the worldwide delegitimization campaign against it, and a boost to anti-Israeli “lawfare,” or attempts by Palestinian groups and others to get Israeli officials tried for “war crimes” abroad. There is indeed some optimism that Goldstone’s retraction significantly takes the wind out of those lawfare attempts.
The real test, though, is whether it will do anything to reverse a situation where Israel’s ability to defend itself against aggression is increasingly in doubt. The extent and nature of Hezbollah’s buildup, and Hamas’s recent heating up of its border with Israel, suggest confidence that despite Israel’s military campaigns against both organizations in recent years, they (with their Iranian and Syrian backers) ultimately have the upper hand.
Essential to restoring that upper hand to Israel is the recognition — which is exactly what the Goldstone Report denied — of the difference between a democratic country defending itself and terrorist organizations using the most cynical means imaginable in fighting it. Whether Israel can now expect more sympathy is something that, according to one veteran Israeli analyst, we may soon find out. Count me pessimistic.
Outside of Israel and its supporters, the world not only didn’t take much note of Goldstone’s article; also the maps in the Wash. Post weren’t much of a hit either. And since it’s been reported that Goldstone’s article was first rejected by the NYT, it’s possible that the Grey Lady was also first approached about the IDF maps, and turned down those too. Or maybe the IDF wouldn’t have been so stupid as to try in the first place.
As Hornik so convincingly shows the infamous Goldstone report turned the truth upside down. It accused Israel of deliberately targeting civilians and failed to identify the ‘Hamas’ strategy of deliberately putting civilians in harm’s way. The retraction of Goldstone will not completely undue the damage which has been done. After all there is an unholy alliance of Islamists and the Radical Left who are working night and day to demonize Israel and undermine its capacity for self – defense. This unholy alliance will continue by any means they can, including ‘lawfare’ to undermine the existence of Israel.
Too little, too late. The people already drank Goldstone’s poison.
The only way the Goldstone slander is “undone” is for the MSM to focus the spotlight on the whole mess – The process, the players, the false conclusions and how those false conclusions were allowed to become “fact” in spite of reams of evidence to the contrary. Of course, those things will never happen because they would indict those doing the presumed investigation and their complicity in the whole blood libel. Once again, the media – their biases, their lies, their adamant refusal to report anything other than “facts” that fit the desired script – IS the story.
The MSM will have to be brought to heel like the lying curs they are. Pretending otherwise will only delay the inevitable and make things worse still.
Wouldn’t this be a good time for the U.S. to get out of the United Nations.
Mr. Hornik – From your pen to God’s eyes. I fear though that the Israel bashers have so much invested in their Israel bashing that they will be in denial about Goldstone’s recanting of his report. They will say the report is the real thing and that Goldstone was pressured into recanting. In other words, they will believe the meta-narrative they want to believe, irrespective of reality. It reminds me of the Duke/LaCrosse case where the leftists were only too happy to believe Crystal Magmum and too ready to condemn the players; it reminds me of global warmists who claim there is global warming when there is a warm day and deny the contrary evidence of relatively cold winters, saying it’s only the weather; it reminds me of Democrats who continue to believe that the government is here to help us, when we can all plainly see that, that is not a believable comment. Long and short of it, Israel bashers will not be convinced because they want to believe what the liers from the religion of pieces (Idiotic Slayings, Lacerations and Mutilations) have to day, the truth be damned. No amount of evidence will convince them otherwise.
Donna Quixote @ #5 – Ditto!!