UNITED NATIONS secretary general Ban Ki-moon yesterday released the responses sent by Israel and the Palestinians to allegations of war crimes during the Gaza conflict in the winter of 2008-2009.
Introducing the 247-page report, Ban stressed the importance of respecting international human rights and humanitarian law, and expressed hope that steps will be taken wherever there are credible allegations of violations.
The UN report noted that Israel launched more than 150 investigations into allegations of misconduct or violations of international law during the 22-day military campaign, launched in December 2008 in an effort to end militant rocket fire into southern Israel. It said the Israeli army opened 47 criminal investigations and initiated criminal prosecutions of four soldiers in separate incidents.
The Palestinian Authority report presented to the UN accused Israel of “acting with impunity, disregarding international law, and justifying its indiscriminate, disproportionate and collective punishment measures against the Palestinian people, as if no limitations applied”.
The Palestinian Authority lost control of Gaza to Hamas following armed clashes in the summer of 2007. The Palestinian report accused the Hamas rulers in Gaza of violating human rights, but stressed there was no moral equivalency between Israeli violations during the Gaza conflict and lack of respect for human rights on the part of Hamas.
Hamas failed to respond to the UN request to send a report.
According to human rights groups, more than half of the 1,400 Palestinians killed in the Gaza war were non-combatants.
Israel put Palestinian fatalities at 1,166, and claimed the majority were militants.
Last November, the UN gave Israel and the Palestinians three months to undertake “independent, credible investigations” into the findings of the UN-appointed panel chaired by retired South African jurist Richard Goldstone, which accused both Israel and militant Palestinian groups of war crimes.
In February, both sides were given an additional five months to conduct their inquiries.
Human Rights Watch called on the UN to maintain pressure on Israel and Hamas to conduct thorough and impartial investigations.
“Israeli investigations still fall far short of being thorough and impartial, while Hamas appears to have done nothing at all to investigate alleged violations,” the organisation’s programme director Iain Levine said in a statement.
“We regret that the secretary-general merely passed on the reports he received from Israel and the Palestinian side, instead of making the failings of these investigations clear.”