A United Nations body adopted a report accusing Israel of “possibly” committing a war crime. The U.N. Rights Council approved a report Sept. 24 centering on the 2006 Israeli shelling of the Gaza village of Beit Hanoun by a 32-9 vote. Written by a fact-finding group led by South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the document states that Israel’s refusal to cooperate with the investigation had “hampered its work.” “Faced with the absence of a well-founded explanation from the Israeli military, the Mission had to conclude that there was a possibility that the shelling of Beit Hanoun constituted a war crime,” according to the report. The United States stopped participating in the council earlier this year because of what it called the group’s “pathetic” record on human rights. Such human rights violators as Cuba, China and Saudi Arabia are all members of the body — and all voted in favor of adopting the report.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
