William A. Jacobson over at Legal Insurrection has an excellent report on the slanderous “Goldstone Report”, Goldstone’s semi-apology for his slanders, and the damage done to Israel and basic, human decency by Goldstone. For those who haven’t been following it, Richard Goldstone was head of a commission established by the United Nations Human Rights Council (member States include Cuba and China) to investigate Israel’s efforts to defend herself against unprovoked rocket attacks coming out of Gaza. The fact that the UN Human Rights Council was involved immediately demonstrated that fair treatment to Israel was impossible – and the report produced confirmed this fact by actually accusing Israel of committing war crimes. The report, itself, has been used with great success by enemies of Israel – especially in the increasingly anti-Semitic political left. That Goldstone is Jewish has just added a level of authority to a report which is really nothing more than a dog’s breakfast of absurd complaints about Israel…a democratic State fighting for it’s life against anti-democratic, anti-human barbarians.
Goldstone has now issued a sort of apology for the report, essentially admitting that he was a willing useful idiot for the terrorists…stupidly figuring that if he condemned Israel, the terrorists leaders would actually do something about all the brutality meted out by the thugs running Gaza. Its like trying to get the Mafia to go legit by arresting the cops. This apology, correctly, is being condemned as inadequate – Goldstone’s report will always exist and will always be used by the terrorists and the global left as an excuse for their continued and increasing attempts to destroy Israel. You can’t un-say a lie and few people will ever hear of Goldstone’s retraction (and those who use Goldstone’s report will just ignore it the apology, even if they do hear about it).
What I wish to hit here is the fundamental absurdity behind the report – that there is something called a “war crime” which can be detected, prosecuted and punished by means other than war. To be sure, crimes can be committed in war, but the idea of a “war crime” is just a bit of globalist, liberal nonsense left over from the early 20th century. Most famously, of course, in the aftermath of World War Two we placed on trial the Nazis of Germany as well as a few of the leaders of Japan…some where executed, others imprisoned for lengthy periods of time. This was supposed to set a new standard for justice…the concept that the leaders of the world could be held legally accountable for their actions.
But, think about it – when we convicted Nazis of plotting aggressive war (one of the charges listed at the Nuremburg tribunal), among the judges were representatives of the USSR (which plotted aggressive war against Poland in agreement with the accused Nazis) as well as representatives of the United Kingdom (which plotted aggressive war against Norway in order to forestall crucial trade between Sweden and Nazi Germany). How can you condemn someone for doing something you’ve done? To be sure, the 6 million murders committed by the Nazis in the death camps cried out for justice…but justice was not served by having Stalin’s representative on the court because Stalin’s regime had already murdered vastly more than 6 million and was to keep on murdering for decades thereafter.
It is said that Winston Churchill opined that, after the war, we should have just picked one fine morning, lead the Nazis out of their cells, and shot them. Brutal? Sure. But it would not have had the stench of rank hypocrisy around it as the war crimes trials did, nor would it have burdened the world with the continuing concept of war crimes trials. Terrorists attack Israel for no reason and Israel is accused of war crimes…heck, former President Bush is held to be a war criminal by the same people who would never dream of trying to put the Hamas leadership on trial. Its just a bunch of nonsense. But nonsense, it must be noted, which comes with a blood price.
The Goldstone report, and efforts like it, convince the terrorists that they can win political victories with ease. All they have to do is launch some missiles at Israel, wait for the response and then shout “war crimes!” knowing that people like Goldstone will pick it up and carry the ball. Result: more pressure on Israel to offer concession, more terrorist attacks on Israel to force more offers of concessions…more and more blood and destruction. And at the back of it, the long-held terrorist hope that the Jews can all be killed or driven out of Israel. That is what Goldstone’s report abetted…and that is what we get for subscribing to an idea as idiotic as “war crimes”.
Have done with it. As we fight wars, make decisions on what we’ll do with enemies captured. Kill them or let them go and make no fuss about it. If we think they’re brutes whom we can’t trust to be free, then kill them…if not, then just let them go after the war is over. Whatever we do, don’t offer inhuman enemies the chance to use our decency against us – don’t allow them to take concepts of “human rights” and “war crimes” and use them to weaken our ability to defeat them. It is time we got back to reality.
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