Reading the UN report on Israel

In the Sept. 30 issue of the IDS, radical activists from Hillel and the Indiana Israeli Public Affairs committee claimed that Judge Richard Goldstone’s report to the U.N. human rights council was somehow biased for unfairly targeting Israel – a helpless victim of “terror.” The unfortunate irony was that their column was downright misleading and biased in its own right.

The authors slyly avoided the details of Israel’s cruel bombardment of Gaza, which according to the Israeli-based human rights group B’Tselem and other independent observers, killed nearly 1,400 people and left thousands more maimed for life or homeless. The report also recounts how Israel, in complete disregard for the Geneva Conventions, used white phosphorus (a banned incendiary weapon) on civilian populations.

The IDS column also left out vital context. Prior to the bombing, Israel subjected Gaza to a harsh blockade that led to the destruction of nearly every sector of life, from fishing to food production and industry. Even during the cease-fire last year when rocket firing was halted, Mary Robinson, the former president of Ireland, visited Gaza and recounted how she witnessed the “destruction of a civilization.”

The authors of the IDS article fail to realize that it is totally ludicrous to call a country a “democracy” that commits war crimes against the native population, deprives them of their land and a nationality, and tortures them with impunity.

Finally, the fact that a U.S. congressman and key members of the Obama administration condemned the U.N. report on Israel is neither meaningful nor surprising. AIPAC and the Israel lobby essentially monopolize discourse related to U.S. policy in the Middle East. To that end, Professors Mearsheimer and Walt provide several examples in their book “The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy” of the unwholesome tactics the lobby uses to silence and humiliate real or imagined critics of Israel within the U.S. government.

Nick Altieri
IU graduate student