Netanyahu: ’Israel’ Won’t Cooperate With UN Probe Over Gaza War

Local Editor

Zionist Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would not cooperate with a United Nations commission investigating "Israel's" conduct during its military aggression against seized Gaza.

Netanyahu said the commission should look elsewhere, not "Israel," for war crimes, and said that "Israel" would not cooperate with its members, although he did not explicitly rule out such cooperation.

"Instead, the UN has decided to come and investigate "Israel," the only democracy in the Middle East, a democracy that acts in a legitimate way to protect its citizens from murderous "terrorism,"" Netanyahu said.

Netanyahu said on Wednesday that the UN Human Rights Council [HRC], which recently this week appointed a commission to investigate the "Israeli" regime's conduct during the month-long military aggression of the so-called "Operation Protective Edge," lends legitimacy to such "terror" groups as Hamas.

Meanwhile, "Israel's" State Comptroller Yosef Shapira announced he would launch an investigation into the military and political leadership's handling of the so-called "Operation Protective Edge."

Netanyahu further said, "This commission's report has already been written, the one leading it [Canadian Prof. William Schabas] has already decided that Hamas is not a "terrorist" organization, and that's why there is nothing for them to do here."

Netanyahu was referring to statements Schabas, a Canadian professor of International Law at London's Middlesex University, has made in the past, calling for Netanyahu and former Zionist president Shimon Peres to stand trial at the International Criminal Court in The Hague for war crimes.

Netanyahu was also referencing comments made by Schabas in an interview with Channel 2 on Tuesday evening, in which he refused to outright condemn Hamas as a "terrorist" organization or reveal how the commission plans to investigate it.

On Monday, "Israel" criticized the appointment of the three members of the investigative UN committee to review the recent military aggression against seized Gaza, saying the identity of the three proved that the results of the probe were a foregone conclusion.

However, Schabas, who was appointed to lead the inquiry, defended his record to "Israeli" media on Tuesday and said past statements he has made that paint him as anti-"Israel" would have no bearing on his probe.

Schabas told Army Radio in an interview on Tuesday that he is not anti-"Israel," has visited "Israel" in the past to give university presentations and is a member of the editorial board of an "Israeli" legal journal.

The probe team has been tasked with reporting back to the council by March 2015.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team