This overture arises from the Gaza Conflict, including Hamas firing rockets into Israel (2008) and Israel responding with a military assault called “Operation Cast Lead” (December 2008 – January 2009).
Concerned about possible violations of International Law on the both sides of the conflict, the Human Rights Council of the United Nations commissioned a Fact-Finding Team to investigate, chaired by Justice Richard Goldstone.
Its findings were published (September 2009) in what is now known as the Goldstone Report, which was rejected by Israel. Two months later, just this past November, the U.S. House of Representatives, in House Resolution 867, called on “… the President and the Secretary of State to continue to strongly and unequivocally oppose any endorsement of the ‘Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict’” (the Goldstone Report) (H.Res. 867 EH, 111th Congress).
In its sweeping denunciation of this report, the U.S. Congress overlooked two of its major recommendations: namely, that should Israel and Hamas not agree with the findings, they initiate their own independent investigations. This overture seeks to rectify this oversight.
1. The U.S. Arms Export Control Act of 1976 prohibits using U.S. weapons against civilians and civilian infrastructure. Sources vary in the particulars, but as a result of Operation Cast Lead, there were more than one thousand persons killed, mostly women and children (with thousands more wounded). Thousands of homes were destroyed with many more damaged. There was extensive destruction and damage to businesses, universities, colleges, schools, medical facilities, the central supply for water, electricity, and sewage treatment. Scores of mosques were destroyed or damaged. Preceding and during the attack upon Gaza, the Hamas military fired rockets into Israeli civilian communities and used the presence of civilians in Gaza as protection for their efforts. 1
2. U.S. taxpayers are contributing $7.6 million per day to the Israeli military and have a right to know whether that money was used appropriately in the defense of Israel.
3. Human rights groups within Israel, such as B’Tselem and Breaking the Silence, are calling on Israel to have an independent investigation of these events.
4. Both Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have released detailed reports based on field research and witness testimony, but urge Israel and Hamas to conduct their own independent studies.
5. The European Parliament urges Israel and the Palestinians to conduct investigations into the Gaza Conflict that “… meet international standards of independence, impartiality, transparency, promptness, and effectiveness” within five months and calls on the European Union to “… work towards a strong E.U. common position on the follow-up to this report” (From a Press Release, March 10, 2010, circulated by al Haq, “Defending Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories).
Endnotes
1. Sources include: Amnesty International; Human Rights Watch; B’Tselem (Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories); “Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict” (The Goldstone Report); and Steadfast Hope, published by the Israel/Palestine Mission Network of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in 2009.