A Defense of Goldstone Criticism

In addition to the report itself, I have devoted a significant amount of time and energy to reading opinion articles, critiques, counter-critiques, letters, and resolutions all pertaining to the Goldstone report. Having done this, I realize that the most irksome thing about all of it are those who criticize the critics.

"When it comes to Israel, hard-core censorship and intimidation by those claiming to speak in the name of the Jewish people have been the order of the day." That is a quote in a letter signed by some hundreds of Jews world-wide.

This quote in a 'Letter to American Jews' is arguably as hypocritical as it is inaccurate.

Since the release of the Goldstone report, there have been more articles and papers than I care to count that literally have combed through the entirety of the report to show exactly where the report errors. These papers looks at the evidence cited by Goldstone and his committee and evidence explicitly ignored by that committee to show that many incidents where the Goldstone 'facts' simply do not sync up with reality.

That is NOT censorship. That is how you have an open debate. If you so strongly believe in the 'Truth' of the Goldstone Report, read it. Read all of the critiques. If after you have done this, you still believe that the critics are being unfair, then you have to explain that to those of us who take issue with the report. We can then look at your counter-arguments and make other claims and responses.

That is how open debate works. I pride myself both on my ability to comprehend critiques and change and alter my views because of well-articulated, well-reasoned arguments. I have seen plenty describing the Goldstone Reports faults. I have seen none to repudiate those claims.

The Rules of War

Recent reports have come out from Israeli sources suggesting a need for changes in the rules of war in light of the growth of terrorism, especially with regard to the increased use of guerilla tactics from civilian population centers which essentially blend civilian and military.

Well, naturally, the Israelis say that they essentially have their hands tied and have no way to protect their civilian population if they can't effectively fight against these ridiculous tactics. Critics are of course saying that Israelis requesting changes to the rules of war all but prove that Israel committed war crimes during Operation Cast Lead.

To both of these groups, I say shut up and stop spouting nonsense.

Has anyone actually ever read the "Rules of War." Try searching for "rules of war" on wikipedia or google. The list of conventions and treaties is really freaking long, so let's do a bit of detective work to see what the rules say, and how they should be interpreted. Of the entire list of wikipedia, the 4th Geneva Convention appears to be what is actually applicable. Here's a link to the text of the convention.

As is the custom of every official document, manuscript, treaty, law, bill, etc, it's written to be as difficult as possible to read with as many possible interpretations to satisfy everyone's whim. Okay. Maybe I am exaggerating a bit, but I'm not that far off.

Article 18 gives the standard spiel that you cannot shoot at hospitals. Sounds good. Article 19 says:

The protection to which civilian hospitals are entitled shall not cease unless they are used to commit, outside their humanitarian duties, acts harmful to the enemy. Protection may, however, cease only after due warning has been given, naming, in all appropriate cases, a reasonable time limit and after such warning has remained unheeded.

The fact that sick or wounded members of the armed forces are nursed in these hospitals, or the presence of small arms and ammunition taken from such combatants and not yet been handed to the proper service, shall not be considered to be acts harmful to the enemy.

Let's say Hamas or Hezbollah or whoever decides to built a military bunker underneath a hospital (note: this isn't actually hypothetical; according to IDF sources which I'm too lazy to find a citation for, it's fact). At what point in time can you say these acts are 'harmful' to the enemy? Is it okay to plan an attack from a hospital? I assume we all agree it's not okay to pick up a gun and start shooting from your 2nd story hospital window. Based on the wording of the 2nd paragraph, one does assume that storing rockets in the hospital is not okay.

But here's the real trick. The wording doesn't say that these violations allow a Power to attack the target, it just says that the "protection ... shall not cease unless..." There is no statement about how to proceed once these violations occur. There is also no mention of the criminality of even using the hospital for non-protected behavior.

Continuing onto Article 20, we see that Medical personnel are entitled to wear and display the emblem (presumably the standard red cross) which places them under the umbrella of protection. These personnel must also carry identification with them to prove their status. It seems pretty straight forward, right?

WRONG!

What happens when a terrorist organization starts driving around the city in an Ambulance with rockets in the back? We all clearly understand that this is a blatant abuse of the rules specified, but how are we supposed to respond. All of the sudden, a Power can no longer assume that ambulances and medical personnel are who they say they are. It's still illegal to prevent medical personnel from getting to wounded, but at the same time, now it is no longer obvious that an ambulance is in fact an ambulance.

There is nothing at all written or suggested (that I can find) that helps explain the 'appropriate' course of action. Israel would obviously maintain that they are now allowed to control ambulance movement, or at the very least stop and search these types of vehicles, and it would be hard to argue otherwise. Now consider that some of the alleged Israeli war crimes are ambulances and medical personnel not being allowed into certain areas in a timely manner. Whose right? Whose wrong?

It's actually not at all obvious. I would say that the Israeli army should set up checkpoints, check medical personnel, and if they are legit, let them pass. Now of course we can keep getting further and further into the nitty gritty.

What if people have forged documents? What about the times where you don't have the military personnel to do searches of every ambulance? Do you let them all in? None of them? I don't have a good answer.

The only thing I am sure of is that is that these ambulances should never have been used for rockets and bombs in the first place. Do yall agree? Let me know what you think.

Can the 4th Geneva Convention be clarified better? Probably. Who should be responsible for civilian casualties in these situations. It doesn't really say. Israel would maintain that clearly those abusing the emblem of medical personnel are in the wrong. I can't disagree with that statement at all. It's clearly true that abusing those emblems is not acceptable. Israel maintains that because of these 'violations' (in quotes because the 4th convention doesn't appear to specify the legality and/or repercussions, but it's possible other conventions do, or I simply didn't see it), it has the right to more tightly control ambulance movement. I think that I agree with that assertion, but the rules of war don't really seem to cover this scenario.

May the rules don't need to be changed; they need to be clarified.

Let's continue to article 28:

The presence of a protected person may not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations.

That's a rather vacuous statement. Don't use civilian populations to try to protect your military operations. That's what the article says. It doesn't say what to do when a group does this. It implies that it is legal to conduct military operations in these areas where civilians are essentially being used as human shields. At some point in time, or in some document, I assume there is a statement that says the Power shall make all attempts to mitigate loss of civilian life in these situations, mainly because I here news agencies repeat this line until they are blue in the face. However I never hear a real quotation, and I certainly don't know who decides what is a reasonable attempt to mitigate loss of life.

It's not clear. That's stupid.

Clearly, it is wrong to use a civilian as a human shield. Clearly it is wrong to hide behind this human shield so that you can kill other civilians. At what point in time, and under what circumstances is it okay to kill both the terrorist and the shield? I'm glad I don't have to make that call. It seems like a difficult one to make.

With all of this in mind. Is it so unreasonable to request that the rules of war be changed? Perhaps it is more reasonable to ask that appropriate conduct with relation to the rules of war be reviewed in these types of situations to assess what is and is not okay.

Hey, did you know that Israeli lawyers actually argue about this stuff before certain attacks that they perform? Unfortunately, it's not something that can be argued about during the heat of battle in all cases. Asking to change the rules of war is perhaps an attempt to make more clarifications regarding specific actions in light of the difficulties in fighting a military group ingrained in a civilian infrastructure.

It doesn't seem like it's an admission of guilt to me. It also seems stupid to be so vague about what you want.

Let's hear your thoughts...

Last Week In the News!

Well, I'm finally gonna get this show rolling. In my weekly news wrap-up, I'm going to try to cover all of the ridiculous things you've seen and read over the past week. And there's no better place to start than with balloon-boy! Actually, there's also absolutely nothing useful to say about it. All this self-involved 'father' wanted was attention, so I'm gonna leave this alone.

Now onto some real news that actually might matter...

* According to White House sources, apparently Fox News isn't actually news at all. I haven't seen this story run anywhere else, but according to foxnews.com, the White House is actively calling on the other major news outlets to join with them against Fox.

Huh? Okay, I get that Fox News has without question a right-leaning bias, but does the White House seriously think this makes any sense? This is the exact type of partisan nonsense that I thought Obama was going to avoid. In 4 or 8 years when a Republican gets into the White House, are we going to reverse this process and call out left-leaning MSNBC, ostracize them from the news world, then re-invite Fox? Of course not!

We all know the media that we get is biased. It's a simple fact that someone else is filtering exactly what and how the news is broadcast to you. To claim that Fox isn't news because of this is stupid partisan hackery. Yeah. It turns out that both Republicans and Democrats are partisan hacks; who'd a guessed!?

The important thing for all of you out there is to make sure you understand the bias of your source. Understand that when you read Fox, you are likely getting it through a Republican's eyes. Understand that even in a news agency that you think is neutral, the people reporting have opinions of their own and there is no way to avoid having those opinions effect your reporting. The internet is great. There is a lot of news reporting from each side of a story, which allows us readers to collate data and form better opinions of our own.

The White House should feel lucky that so far it seems no other news agency wants to be part of their ridiculous tomfoolery. But no news organization wants to open those floodgates at all.

* Something a bit lighter... Some parents upset at Where the Wild Things Are movie! A recent cnn.com article highlights parent's frustration at the movie based on Maurice Sendak's classic children's book.

Apparently, some parents are upset because it wasn't actually a movie intended for their children after all. These parents cite things such as their 5-year old daughter copying Max's tantrums and even biting her mother in the same fashion as Max does in the movie.

To be perfectly honest here... How is it that parents suck so much these days? Did these parents just assume that the PG rating couldn't possibly mean their child shouldn't come to the movie? Seriously, when your kid is 5 years old, it's hard to justify taking him or her to see any movie that isn't rated G without screening it first. Didn't these parents read a single review of the movie? (Here's one from cnn.com)

I saw Where the Wild Things Are on Friday evening, and there is no way in hell I would have taken a 5 year old to see it. The movie was clearly geared towards older children and adults who had a nostalgia for the book; it was clearly not geared towards the child you still read it to every night. The movie was powerful, deep, and did a fabulous job at expressing a child's inner frustrations. Max absolutely matures through his experience with the Wild Things in ways that your young child will not understand. Parents be warned; read reviews and check out movies for yourself before you take your children to them.

Since I brought it up - sorta - here's a quick shout out to my parents who decidedly do not suck. You couldn't ask for better, unless you're a 10-year-old smart-aleck kid. At the very least, they never threatened to tie me to a helium blimp and let me float up to 7,000 feet; that's gotta count for something.

* Iran Nuke talks have finally started... I think.

Has there ever been so much nothing to happen given how much of an issue this is supposed to have been? The war of words and political posturing in relation to the Iranian nuclear issue has far outweighed any substantiative change in anything. It is now October 19th as I write this. Obama has been in office for around 9 months. It seems that everyone important also agrees that it is probably too late to stop Iran from getting the bomb anyway. Iran continues to state that under no circumstances will it stop enriching uranium, and yet somehow the only headline I can find on the issue says that today the talks were 'off to a good start' (cnn.com article).

I guess that I probably won't get killed because Iran gets a Nuke, but I'm still not a big fan of that prospect. Diplomatic talks on this issue should have started a months ago if they were going to do anything productive. I'm perfectly happy with diplomacy, but does anyone actually believe Iran is being genuine? Anyone!? I'm sure that a lot of crap happens behind the scenes to which the public isn't exposed, but seriously... Iran is just stringing everyone along.

* Lastly, I'm going to finish with a bit more humor. Well, it's humor to some and a serious offense to others. Immigrant rights activists are once again up in arms. This time, it's over an out-of-this-world costume.

Take a look:

Acquired through nbcloasangles website. Originally from Target.

The chief complaint... This quote is attributed to Angelic Salas on many news sites. Salas is a member of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles

[It's] distasteful, mean-spirited and ignorant of social stigmas and current debate on immigration reform.

Here's a question... err... comment... What? When you say something like that, you really need to explain why it's distasteful, where the malice is, or what about the costume is 'ignorant of current debate.' In fact, I'm not even sure what a satirical costume being ignorant of current debate means.

Check out this quote taken from cnn.com:

Jorge-Mario Cabrera, the director of communications for CHIRLA, said he initially thought the costume was a stab at harmless satire. But when he saw the Green Card, he realized it was a swipe at illegal immigrants.

There's no way the Green Card makes or breaks this costume. Actually, the only thing it does it make the costume confusing, since having an up to date Green Card is the definition of being here legally. Considering that, it could be fair to argue that the costume was unfairly taking a swipe at legal immigrants who are being unfairly discriminated against due to the existence of their illegal counterparts, but that's probably a bit of stretch.

In actuality, the swipe is that the depiction of an extra-terrestrial as the illegal 'alien' dehumanizes these illegal immigrants. That's the claim at least. That's what Salas probably means by 'distasteful.' However, I'm pretty sure that the costume is making fun of the terminology, not the people.

I hope yall enjoyed my take on things. If you have question, comments, concerns, feedback, bored ramblings, etc, let me hear it. If you have something you want to hear about, leave a comment and I'll look into it.