Absolutely nothing has improved in Gaza since the IDF leveled the place last year and and winter is coming.

Israel today stands accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Using civilians as human shields to terrorize the population, being one such horrific allegation.

The U N Human Rights Commission report today recommends that the Security Council take this matter before the International War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague.

It is taken for granted that the Obama Government will not seek to protect alleged war criminals by allowing LOBBY GROUPS to exert pressure on it to use its VETO to frustrate international justice, the rule of law and democracy.

That would be condoning war crimes, an act from which no government could recover.

Obviously, the full-court press by the GOI and her dear friends to discredit the UN report that MJ finds superfluous is proof enough that there is great fear that it will further isolate the light unto nations.

No one is seriously concerned that the UN Security Council will refer the matter to the ICC; our automatic veto will take care of that possibility. In fact, it's dubious that the UN SC will even be allowed to consider the Goldstone report.

Lawyer types considering possible concrete reactions to the report believe that the greatest danger lies in lawsuits being filed (in countries that allow them) against Israelis involved in the Chanukah War

While the GOI "leadership" is reportedly making phone calls to the heads of foreign governments begging them to publically denounce the report, the fact that a South African Jewish judge heads up the investigation makes that scenario unlikely. Although, I won't be surprised if Susie Rice and other Obama spokespeople/functionaries do express "concerns" that Israel is being unfairly singled out. That would be par for the well-played out American course.

From Arutz Sheva:

Israel to Launch Diplomatic Offensive Over Gaza Report

Reported: 22:10 PM - Sep/15/09
Follow Israel news briefs on and .

(IsraelNN.com)
Israeli officials will engage in extensive diplomacy to deflect the consequences of the Goldstone panel report, diplomatic sources said Tuesday night. President Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman will be manning the phones already on Wednesday, speaking to world leaders and foreign ministers, and asking them to publicly condemn what Israel called a one-sided report, which emphasizes alleged Israeli "war crimes," but takes a softer line on rocket attacks on southern Israel by Gaza Arab terrorists.

"This is going to be a long diplomatic and legal battle," one Israeli diplomat said Tuesday. "We will work with our friends around the world, especially the U.S., in order to prevent the isolation of Israel," the diplomat said.

We provide relief to people even in the most totalitarian places on earth. The only reason Gaza is treated differently is because we are deferring to the Likud government which is indifferent to thie suffering Israel created. The Obama administration should not be, but so far it has done nothing about Gaza.

That is not true. Most often, the US creates the suffering for which other people provide relief. Just in the last few years, millions of displaced persons and refugees in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia as a result of US trying to shape other societies for the benefit of our dear corporations. In Somalia, just as one example, U.S. "relief" consists on paying the Ethiopian army to keep the civil war going. In Pakistan the US is paying the Pakistani army for creating refugees. Sweden spends about five time comparatively on foreign aid, not to mention that the bulk of US foreign aid is assistance to US corporations masked as development or disaster relief.

Nor does this have anything to do with a "Likud government." Ehud Barak and Labor are part of the government. Now maybe your memory is different than mine, but I don't remember Shimon Peres, or anybody else from Labor arguing against the massacres in Gaza that Goldstone investigated. I do remember some Israeli "leftists", most importantly David Grossman, writing op-eds in the U.S. at the beginning of the massacres justifying war crimes and calling for talks.

And of course, you don't think war crimes are that important. So somebody ordered a massacre! Big deal! Let bygones be bygones! Why focus on the war crimes of the past when Gabi Ashkenazi is already planning the war crimes of the future, which, when they do happen, you will make the same argument, that punishing the criminals is not as important as forging ahead with peace?

Of course you are right in theory that punishing the criminals is not as important as protecting today's and tomorrow victims. But the only way to
do it is to put the fear of God, or at least the fear of the prosecutor, into the heart of Israeli politicians and generals. That means all the possible pressure on Israel. That means investigating, appointing special tribunals, calling the UN to investigate, calling every country to investigate under "universal jurisdiction," opening civil courts for damage claims, asking the ICC to investigate and to indict, etc.

But you wouldn't want to go that way, because that might actually work, or more likely, it will make you unemployable.

Better call for a new government in Israel with Tzipi Livni and Ehud Barak. That would solve everything and bring peace on earth.

Until the next massacre.