U.N. rights envoy sees Israeli war crimes in Gaza
* Sealing Gaza border may also be a crime against humanity
* Falk urges experts probe alleged crimes by both sides
By Stephanie Nebehay
GENEVA, March 19 (Reuters) - A United Nations human rights investigator said on Thursday that Israel's military assault on densely populated Gaza appeared to constitute a grave war crime.
Richard Falk, U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, said the Geneva Conventions required warring forces to distinguish between military targets and surrounding civilians.
"If it is not possible to do so, then launching the attacks is inherently unlawful and would seem to constitute a war crime of the greatest magnitude under international law," Falk said.
"On the basis of the preliminary evidence available, there is reason to reach this conclusion," he wrote in an annual 26-page report submitted to the U.N. Human Rights Council.
Falk gave the same death toll from Israel's offensive in December and January -- 1,434 Palestinians, including 960 civilians -- as the Palestinian human rights center.
Israel, which lost 13 people during the war, disputes the figures and has accused Hamas fighters in Gaza of using civilians as human shields during the conflict -- an allegation which Falk said should be investigated.
He called the Israeli attacks a "massive assault on a densely populated urbanised setting" in which the entire civilian population had been subjected to "an inhumane form of warfare that kills, maims and inflicts mental harm".
"As all borders were sealed, civilians could not escape from the orbit of harm," he said.
This denial of people's right to flee the war zone as refugees may also constitute a crime against humanity, he said.
Falk called for an independent experts group to probe possible war crimes committed by both Israeli forces and Hamas. It should gather eyewitness testimony as well as explanations from Israeli and Palestinian military commanders.
Violations included Israel's alleged "targeting of schools, mosques and ambulances" during the offensive, which lasted from Dec. 27 to Jan. 18, and its use of weapons including white phosphorus, as well as Hamas's firing of rockets at civilian targets in southern Israel.
Falk said that Israel's blockade of the coastal strip of 1.5 million people violated the Geneva Conventions and this suggested further war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity.
The aggression was not legally justified and may represent a "crime against peace" -- a principle established at the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals, according to Falk, an American law professor who serves as the Human Rights Council's independent investigator.
Falk, who is Jewish, suggested the Security Council might set up an ad hoc criminal tribunal to establish accountability for war crimes in Gaza, noting Israel has not signed the Rome statutes establishing the International Criminal Court.
He was denied entry to Israel two weeks before the assault started, forcing him to abort a planned mission to Gaza. In his report, he said that the refusal had set an "unfortunate precedent" for treatment of a special rapporteur.
On Monday, he is to present his report formally to the Human Rights Council, a 47-member forum where Islamic and African countries backed by China, Cuba and Russia have a majority. Neither Israel nor its chief ally the United States are members. (Editing by Mark Trevelyan and Jonathan Wright)
http://www.reuters.com/article/middleeastCrisis/idUSLJ155314
- March 19, 2009 - 7:54PM
Israeli soldiers on the Israel-Gaza border before deploying into the Gaza Strip. Photo: AFP
JERUSALEM, - Israeli soldiers have described wanton killings of Palestinian civilians and destruction of property during the deadly 22-day Gaza offensive, according to a journal published today.
One soldier described the case of an Israeli sharpshooter who killed a Palestinian mother and her two children who had left their home on a path the troops had declared off-limits, according to the journal of the Yitzhak Rabin pre-military academy.
The publication, which quoted graduates of the college's military preparatory course, also cited the case of an elderly Palestinian woman killed as she was walking 100 metres from her home.
Soldiers also spoke of civilians being abused, acts of vandalism and destruction of homes.
"Those were very harsh testimonies about unjustified shooting of civilians and destruction of property that conveyed an atmosphere in which one feels entitled to use unrestricted force against Palestinians," academy director Dany Zamir told public radio.
He added that military officers were surprised by the findings he relayed to them.
A military spokesman said he was unaware of the incidents mentioned in the journal.
"We will check their credibility and if there is cause to do so, we will launch an investigation," he said.
The Israeli military onslaught on Gaza was launched in late December in response to rocket and mortar fire into Israel by militants in the impoverished territory.
Gaza medics said more than 1,300 Palestinians were killed in the 22-day conflict, and much of the infrastructure in the coastal strip was left in ruins.
Thirteen Israelis were killed.
AFP
UN rights envoy sees Israeli war crimes in Gaza
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