Israel on Tuesday rejected calls made in a UN report for conducting an independent investigation into allegations of war crimes and crimes and against humanity committed by the Israeli forces during the 2008-09 Gaza invasion.
"Israel has no intention of creating a verification commission," Israel public radio quoted Information and Diaspora Minister Yuli Edelstein as saying from New York on Tuesday.
Edelstein made the remarks a day after his meeting with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in New York. The minister said that he had informed the UN chief about his country's intentions during Monday's meeting. Edelstein said Israel will, however, submit the details of its own investigations into the war before the UN later this week.
The UN general Assembly earlier, on 5th November 2009, passed a resolution endorsing a report submitted by a UN-appointed investigating committee that probed alleged war crimes by Israeli forces and Hamas militants during the December-January Gaza conflict.
It came as no surprise as the resolution was widely expected to be passed, with most of the Arab and Non-Aligned Movement countries in the 192-nation assembly supporting the motion. But unlike UN Security Council resolutions, the General Assembly resolutions are not legally binding.
The resolution demands both Israel and Hamas carry out separate internal investigations that "are independent, credible and in conformity with international standards" into allegations of war crimes committed by their forces during the Gaza conflict.
The resolution also required UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to report back to the General Assembly after three months on the progress made in the internal investigations carried out by Israel and Hamas about the conduct of their forces during the three-week war.
The resolution also called on Ban to forward the report to the UN Security Council for possible action if Israelis and the Palestinians fail to launch independent investigations into alleged war crimes by 5th February 2010, as recommended in the report. Earlier, the UN Human Rights Council, a 47-member inter-governmental body within the U.N. for protecting and promoting human rights globally, voted on 12th January 2009 to set up the probe into the alleged human rights violations by Israeli forces against the Palestinians.
Richard Goldstone, a former South African Judge, was then appointed as chief of the 15-member UN team set up to investigate alleged violations of international rules of engagement during the Gaza conflict.
In October 2009, the Council endorsed the UN team's report during a two-day special session held in Geneva after Judge Goldstone placed a full version of the fact-finding probe before the UN rights body in late September. The Council's endorsement of the report came despite warnings by the U.S. and Israel that such a move would set back Middle East peace efforts.
The UN team concluded in their 575-page report that actions amounting to war crimes and crimes against humanity were committed by the Israeli security forces and Hamas militants during the Gaza offensive.
The report listed a series of recommendations, including the handing over of the case to an international tribunal if Israel and Hamas fail to conduct proper investigations into the alleged war crimes within six months.
Israel and Hamas rejected the UN report, describing it as biased. While Israel said that it would launch a diplomatic offensive to prevent any possible prosecutions of its soldiers by an international war crimes tribunal, Hamas criticized the UN team's findings and described it as "political, biased and dishonest" report that put people "who resist" crimes "on the same level as those who perpetrate" them.
Israel was involved in a 22-day offensive against the Hamas in the Gaza Strip during December, in response to continued rocket fire into southern Israel by Palestinian militants in Gaza. The three-week war was finally halted on 17th January with separate unilateral cease-fire by Israel and Hamas, the radical Islamist group that controls Gaza Strip.
Though Palestinians claim that over 1,400 civilians in the Gaza Strip were killed in the conflict, Israeli army says its investigations revealed that only 1,116 Palestinians were killed in the three-week long offensive.
For comments and feedback contact: editorial@rttnews.com
May 22, 2026 14:46 ET Minutes of the latest Fed policy session was the highlight of the week along with survey data on the U.S. housing market. In Europe, survey data signaled the trends in the euro area private sector. Further, consumer price inflation data from the U.K. was in focus. In Asia, various economic indicators from China drew attention to the health of the economy.