Israel Pushes To Change International Laws Of War After Damning Gaza Report

Israel's prime minister has instructed his government to draw up plans for a "world wide campaign" to lobby for changes in the international laws of war.

The order from Binyamin Netanyahu follows a special cabinet meeting on Tuesday to discuss Israel's response to the UN's Goldstone report, which condemned Israel's actions during the 22-day war on Gaza earlier this year.

The meeting also called for the formation of a special committee to deal with the international legal consequences of the report and the prospect Israeli officials could face war crimes trials abroad.

The Israeli government contends international law needs to be amended in order to fight global terrorism.

"The prime minister instructed the relevant government bodies to examine a worldwide campaign to amend the international laws of war to adapt them to the spread of global terrorism," Netanyahu's office said in a statement following Tuesday's meeting.

It added that the cabinet had also instructed justice ministry officials to form a committee to deal with the prospect of "legal proceedings abroad against the state of Israel or its citizens".

"We need to keep punching a hole in this lie that is spreading with the help of the Goldstone report," Netanyahu was quoted as saying in the statement.

Read the whole story: Al Jazeera.

Comments

[You and Eye]

The goldstone report calls out both sides to answer charges of war crimes and human rights violations. Today I watched Mr. Goldstone inquire as to the specific objections the U.S. has to the report. Without discussing differences nothing positive is gained. Now Israel is looking into changing rules. This reminds me of the B. administration wanting to know how to get aroung the laws governing "enhanced interrogation."

[Blackorpheus]

Israel want its ongoing official terrorism against Palestine to be declared legal: a signal part of the worldwide battle against "global terrorism." And Israel proposes to lobby to change the international law that has--in its view--singled out Israel as one of the most egregious offenders.

Israel may in fact successfully change the law in its--and other violently colonizing "first world" countries'--favor. A revoltingly egregious example, this, that patently separates "law" from "justice"-­-categorie­s that are nearly always rendered equivalent.

[blueskybigstar]

This story should be on the front page.

[blueskybigstar]

End sending money to Israel now.

[AN2009]

According to Haaretz, Joe Lockhart, who served as Bill Clinton's press secretary, remarked that Binyamin Netanyahu was "one of the most obnoxious individuals you're going to come into -- just a liar and a cheat. He could open his mouth and you could have no confidence that anything that came out of it was the truth." Netanyahu was also responsible for the disastrous assassination attempt on Hamas leader Khaled Meshal, effectively destroying his administration's relations with Jordan and Canada (the Mossad agents had forged Canadian passports when they conducted their failed attack in broad daylight on Jordanian soil). Moreover, he demanded that Jonathan Pollard, who sold classified American information to Israel, be released as a condition for peace in the Middle East, a demand which the US refused to grant.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1063057.html
http://www.nytimes.com/1998/11/14/opinion/the-case-of-jonathan-pollard.html

[phute]

NOV 24th 1989 - HOTAM Israeli publication.
Taken from a speech made by the then Israeli foreign Minister.

As the civilized world condemned China for it's brutal and repressive policy against pro democracy groups - especially events in and around Tiananmen Square Netanyahu saw things differently.

.......'Israel should have exploited the repression of te demonstrations in China, when world attention focussed on that country . tocarry out mass expulsions among the Arabs of the Territories'.

'Exploiting repression' - what can you say?

[blueskybigstar]

fanned

[rissole]

Is it at all possible for one country to do this?

[MarcusT]

No

[blueskybigstar]

fanned

[blueskybigstar]

I did not fan this person

[MarcusT]

No, it is not.

[Paulo1]

A piece of logical deduction:

If Israel is now pushing for a change in the rules for war crimes.

Then there must be an error in said rules that has been violated.

Violations of the rules are by definition war crimes.

Therefore Israel has just admitted to war crimes and is proposing that the solution is to change the rules

[blueskybigstar]

fanned

[nexxtep54]

It's not like Israel follows the current international laws of war. This is a dangerous man. Wants the laws remade to justify past violations.

[CigarGod]

Whew!
I just thought of something.
Is Netanyahu going to announce a Propaganda Minister?
And will he be a "Doctor"?

[Black North]

According to a lecture he delivered in Israel in 2000 Judge Goldstone believes bringing war criminals to justice stems from the lessons of the Holocaust and that war crimes against humanity should resonate differently to Jewish ears, in light of how the Holocaust shaped conventions relevant to the subject. Binyamin Netanyahu's desire to change these laws to exempt Israel's actions in Gaza seems inappropriate and frankly more than a little delusional. However, we in the West should take our part of the blame for the drunken sense of power without responsibility that Israel feels is its by right. How many times have we sat back silently and watched as Israel acquired an arsenal of 100+ nuclear bombs, occupied other countries land, facilitated the mass murders at the Sabra-Shatila camps, sent assassins around the world to execute those they consider terrorists, killed innocent bystanders with car bombs to get at one man... ? The answer is too many. How many times has the United States, the UK or France blocked UN resolutions to hold it to account? Too many. It is therefore unsurprising that Israel believes it has a permanent get out of jail card. It is the difficult duty of the Western leaders, particularly Pres. Obama, to make clear in unmistakable words and deeds that this card has been cancelled. Ultimately this will benefit not just the terrorized Palestinians or the frightened Lebanese but also the state that was born out of the ultimate crime against humanity, the Holocaust.

[ReedYoung]

Since welcoming a million refugees from the former Soviet Union (supposedly Jewish, but ...), the fastest growing sector of Israel's economy is its military-industrial complex. Don't you wonder how many were KGB?

[JohnnyKay]

"Jewish.... KGB"?

A bit of an oxymoron, don't you think?

[lightningbolt]

The biggest change that needs to be made is that nations who violate human rights should not have the right to sit on the UN Human Rights Council. That alone totally destroys the credibility of the council.

[CigarGod]

Another very silly post.
Pray tell, what perfect nations do you suggest?

[jwcmass]

lightningbolt

Shall we all leave alphabetically?

[uinsane]

"The Israeli government contends international law needs to be amended in order to fight global terrorism."

which will put the iisrael govt on top of that list as the bigest global terrorist.

[MARNIE2]

Israel' P. M......is rightfull so to push forth this plans . he is at lest working with the International [laws]
to put forth a change ., in the fight ...on terror.......... unlike some Radical govt. who fight up against
international laws ! ......ALL AVENUE'S SHOULD BE EXPLORED.....IN COMBATTING THE WAR WITH TERRORIST ....... ! is this not right for .. {.innocent people } to feel SAFE .....AT WORK..HOME....
WALKING TO SHOPS ! TERRORIST GLEE AT KILLING THE INNOCENT'S !
.....we should also fight the terrorist .....by....bringing [HOPE ] TO THE PEOPLE WHO NEED IT... !
IF ..all they ....see in their ..life is unhappiness & suffering... their ...life ...they value as if nothing .
then death is seen as a good thing= paradise ?.NOT SO !!. ......trust in GOD .....and shine a good lite on the..world... & your people ! HOPE !

[jwcmass]

Wouldn't you say that the people of Gaza were terrorized by both the IDF AND Hamas/

and how about the people of Iraq? -- you know it's bad when they were saying they wished they had Saddam back (saddam wasn't exactly popular with his own people-- to make such a statement shows how desparate they were.)

How do we define terrorism? Isn't bombing, shelling, dropping missles just as terrorizing as suicide bombing?

What about torture? Should we now legalize that too? But isn't that terrorism (suing terror to obtain your political goals) also?

What good are having principles and values, if the moment we experience an attack, we jettison them. Then (as Jon Stewart so aptly put it) they are not values or principles, they are hobbies.

[alysheba 3]

How about a story from the Jerusalem Post?

PM: Change the laws of war to deal with terrorism
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1256037270297&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

AFP?

Israel wants law of war changed after damning UN Gaza report
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jzYm9qJsFN5hXTCqOKrraGa6NgWQ

I would say Al Jezeera got the scoop. Too bad your "claim" doesn't stand up.

[CigarGod]

I have to agree with my fellow deity LoneyGod, that something about this is a bit odd.
Even HP is not running this story on their home page. If they were, it would have more than the 199 comments it currently has.

[alysheba 3]

I have posted links (not leading back to Al Jazeera).

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jzYm9qJsFN5hXTCqOKrraGa6NgWQ

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1256037270297&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

Please note that the second link is to the Jerusalem Post.