Israel Prepares to Rebut Goldstone
As Israel prepares to publish its official response to the UN's Goldstone Report, we highlight some more recent analyses and commentaries.
As reported by the New York Times, Israel is preparing to release its own rebuttal to the Goldstone Report, some of the contents of which were released to the newspaper:
One concerned the destruction of Gaza's sole flour mill. The Goldstone report asserts that the Bader flour mill "was hit by an airstrike, possibly by an F-16." The Israeli investigators say they have photographic proof that this is false, that the mill was accidentally hit by artillery in the course of a firefight with Hamas militiamen.
The dispute is significant since the United Nations report asserts that "the destruction of the mill was carried out for the purpose of denying sustenance to the civilian population," an explicit war crime.
A second finding concerned the destruction of a wastewater plant, leading to an enormous outflow of raw sewage. The Goldstone report contended that it was hit by a powerful Israeli missile in a strike that was "deliberate and premeditated." The Israelis say they had nothing to do with that plant's collapse and suggest that it may have been the result of Hamas explosives.
The two cases, along with the destruction of chicken coops, water wells, a cement plant and some 4,000 homes, are crucial building blocks in the Goldstone case that Israel set out to eliminate infrastructure so as to cause intense civilian suffering.
cont here: Israel Prepares to Rebut Goldstone"
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