STATE on Goldstone: Not quite the condemnation the Israelis preferred......

State Department spokesman Ian Kelly provided reaction today to the report by the Gaza fact finding commission led by South African judge Richard Goldstone. Israel has been frantically seeking a strong statement of rejection by the Obama administration of the Goldstone report's conclusions and recommendations, out of concern they could lead to referral for further action at the United Nations in New York. Today, Kelly said:

"So I have a reaction to the report of the fact-finding mission of Justice Goldstone. As President Obama made clear at the time of the events covered by the report, we are deeply concerned about the loss of life and humanitarian suffering in both Israel and Gaza. As we’ve said previously, prior to U.S. membership, the UN’s Human Rights Council set forth a one-sided and unacceptable mandate for this fact-finding investigation.
Although the report addresses all sides of the conflict, its overwhelming focus is on the actions of Israel. While the report makes overly sweeping conclusions of fact and law with respect to Israel, its conclusions regarding Hamas’s deplorable conduct and its failure to comply with international humanitarian law during the conflict are more general and tentative.
We also have very serious concerns about the report’s recommendations, including calls that this issue be taken up in international fora outside the Human Rights Council and in national courts of countries not party to the conflict. We note in particular that Israel has the democratic institutions to investigate (But Mr. Kelly, Israel refuses to do so?!) and prosecute abuses, and we encourage it to use those institutions.
We believe this report should be discussed within the Human Rights Council, and we look forward to participating in that discussion. We will approach discussions on the report keeping in mind the underlying causes of the tragic events in Gaza earlier this year – the lack of a peace agreement between the Israelis and the Palestinians, and the attacks by Hamas against innocent civilians.
Our focus right now, as I’ve said before, is to get all sides to take steps to re-launch Israeli-Palestinian negotiations so we can end this conflict and the humanitarian suffering it has caused. We will move forward in discussions of the report while keeping that overriding goal at the forefront. We hope efforts related to the Middle East at the Human Rights Council and other international bodies will look to the future and how we can support the goal of a two-state solution."

This is probably not quite as full-throated a condemnation of the Gaza commission's report as the Israeli government would have preferred, but would seem to serve to indicate that the Obama administration will not refrain from using its power at the UN to try to prevent additional action based on the report's recommendations from going forward. Israel is also apparently lobbying governments in Europe to distance themselves from the Gaza report, saying it sets a precedent that would make democracies fighting terrorism in urban areas subject to possible war crimes prosecutions. That's an argument that certainly has strong resonance in the United States, in the midst of lethal post-conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. But the episode also demonstrates the degree to which Israel in many respects relies chiefly on good will from Washington in order to protect it in a sometimes hostile international diplomatic environment, even while Jerusalem has resisted requests by Washington to take significant steps towards a settlement freeze that would help facilitate the resumption of peace negotiations."