Israel facing war crimes charges

Jerusalem Post ^ | 9/13/6 | AP & JPost.com staff

[SmithL]

Israel's war with Hizbullah guerrillas opened the door to accusations on both sides of war crimes. But can anyone be prosecuted?

Israeli aircraft and artillery killed more than 850 Lebanese during the 34-day conflict, most of them civilians, and left a moonscape of ruin.

Hizbullah pummeled northern Israel with thousands of rockets that killed 39 civilians among the total Israeli war dead of 159.

Now human rights groups in Lebanon are collecting evidence that could be used in cases filed under a legal principle known as universal jurisdiction, which says that war crimes are so serious they can be prosecuted anywhere, not just where they were committed.

The UN has harshly criticized Israel's use of cluster bombs in the last days of the conflict.

The world body's humanitarian chief Jan Egeland last month called the cluster bomb attacks "completely immoral."

Hizbullah also is open to war crimes allegations for deliberately targeting Israeli civilians with their rocket barrages, but no one is known to be preparing a dossier to prosecute leaders of the Shi'ite group.

Amnesty International has also called for a comprehensive, independent and impartial inquiry to be conducted by the UN into violations of international humanitarian law by both sides in the conflict.

The inquiry, according to Amnesty, should examine in particular the impact of the conflict on the civilian populations, and should be undertaken with a view to holding individuals responsible for crimes under international law and ensuring that full reparation is provided to the victims.

Israelis are also are more likely to be caught in other countries where they could be tried because they travel overseas far more than Hizbullah representatives.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev accused groups of "trying to exploit the legal system in some countries for an anti-Israel agenda."

He confirmed that Israel has a team working on how to deal with the possibility of overseas prosecutions.

"It is unfortunately an ongoing problem," he said. "We spoke to several governments in Europe.

We see this as a cynical exploitation of the legal system and we hear from many governments that they agree with our assessment."

Kate Maynard, of the London law firm Hickman and Rose which has in the past represented Palestinians in cases against Israel, said groups already are compiling evidence in Lebanon of alleged Israeli war crimes because it is the only way such offenses will be prosecuted.

"There is impunity in Israel," she said. "The only place they will be tried is outside Israel."

She declined to give any details of the groups or the cases they were working on and would not say if her firm was involved.

"It is not going to be quick," she said. "Any credible legal work is going to have to be put together slowly and carefully."

The most likely course of action for groups seeking to have people prosecuted is for them to gather evidence and prepare it in a dossier that could then be translated and tailored for several different countries' legal systems, experts say.

That way, if a military officer or government official were found traveling overseas, the groups could rush the dossier to local prosecutors and urge them to file charges.

"You have to get somebody while they are traveling or rely on (the) complicated and difficult ... process of extradition," Maynard said.

Since 2000, several European countries including Britain and Belgium have given war crimes cases "momentum across the continent," Human Rights Watch said in a recent report on universal jurisdiction.

Last year, Doron Almog, a retired Israeli general, refused to get off a plane in London after he was tipped off he was about to be arrested by British authorities over a 2002 air strike that killed a Hamas leader and 14 others, nine of them children. He flew straight home.

As well as the hurdle of getting Israeli suspects in custody, Prof. Terry Gill, an international law expert at Utrecht University, said there likely would be a lack of political will among European countries to launch prosecutions as they begin sending troops to bolster the UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, UNIFIL.

"The success of UNIFIL depends on a number of things, including cooperation from the Israeli army," he said.

[SmithL]

Anything Israels does to defend itself is considered a war crime.

[The Blitherer]

I say Israel declares war on any country that lays a finger on one of its citizens traveling abroad and makes it known beforehand that they are keeping the nuclear option open as well.

[Red6]

Every Islamist captured was abused.

[WoofDog123]

apparently it is illegal for war to be hell.

[Red6]

War is no longer PC. Ask a Democrat-

[MrEdd]

All the bodies wore the uniform of Hezb'Allah. Case Closed

[sandra_789]

"Hizbullah also is open to war crimes allegations for deliberately targeting Israeli civilians with their rocket barrages, but no one is known to be preparing a dossier to prosecute leaders of the Shi'ite group."

[EQAndyBuzz]

Call me when Rwanda and Darfur are mentioned.

[Solamente]

From whom. pray effing tell.

[arthurus]

It is all an excuse to bar the Jews from Europe. They are all indictible as war criminals now, I'm sure.

[arthurus]

Europe is trying to sneak back aboard the judenrein boat. Make them all indictible for war crimes.

[TigersEye]

Fine. Isreal should counter-sue Lebanon for allowing Hizb'Allah to set up for six years. Isreal should be awarded double whatever the settlement is for Lebanon.

[CremeSaver]

Isn't Jan Egeland the same guy who called the US "stingy" after the tsunami?

[LoneRangerMassachusetts]

The antisemitic International Court of Criminals is hard at work building illegal claims against those who defend themselves. Hague needs to go the way of Carthage.

[MarkL]

How many of the dead lebonese were terrorists? Since the enemy of Israel was not wearing uniforms, and Israel went to great pains to contact civilians and tell them to evacuate before their attacks (one good way to ensure you miss the bad guys is to tell them "I'll be there in 20 minutes"), Israel is NOT guilty of war crimes. The lebanese government, and the fact that they allowed a terrorist group to wage a war against a sovereign country is guilty of crimes against its own citizens.

But those are facts, and a trial involving Israel will have no use for something as silly as facts.

Mark

[Publius6961]

Now human rights groups in Lebanon are collecting evidence that could be used in cases filed under a legal principle known as universal jurisdiction
which says that war crimes are so serious they can be prosecuted anywhere, not just where they were committed.

Isn't it amazing the crap you can come up with when you are ignorant, young and delusional?

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

How many divisions does this insane group have?
Who are their "enforcers"? The French?
* chortle *

[mcshot]

And a big second to your post.

[Publius6961]

Israeli aircraft and artillery killed more than 850 Lebanese during the 34-day conflict, most of them civilians

Of course they were all "civilians"!
Muslim Mass Murdering terrorists don't wear uniforms!

D'OH!

[somniferum]

Now human rights groups in Lebanon are collecting evidence that could be used in cases filed under a legal principle known as universal jurisdiction, which says that war crimes are so serious they can be prosecuted anywhere, not just where they were committed.

A very frightening doctrine, even for a toothless (for now) organization like the UN to operate under.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

If lawyers are going to fight the future wars then give them guns and send them out. Otherewise, STFU.