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Netanyahu: No New Israeli Inquiry into Gaza War

[Ha'aretz] Barak Ravid - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has nixed the idea of setting up an inquiry committee into alleged Israeli war crimes in Gaza as a means of dealing with the Goldstone Commission's report. Netanyahu, who held two meetings on the subject on Wednesday, believes a more effective way of blocking the report would be to make it clear to the international community that referral to the International Criminal Court would sound the death knell of the peace process. Defense Minister Ehud Barak also said he opposes an inquiry commission. Netanyahu's associates said that setting up an inquiry commission would imply that the probes now being conducted by the Israel Defense Forces are untrustworthy. Netanyahu told a group of ambassadors Wednesday that the Goldstone report undermines the UN itself by gutting the legitimate right of self-defense. If this approach is authorized against Israel, it will ultimately be used against other nations, too. No nation would agree to take risks for peace, such as ceding territory, if they were afterward denied the right of self-defense against attacks from that territory. Hence anyone who cares about peace must block the Goldstone report, he said.
2009-10-01 08:00:00
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