Goldstone recants

Judge Richard Goldstone has changed his mind. Writing in the Washington Post, he admits that his “fact-finding mission had no evidence” for key allegations made in the UN report into the Gaza war that bears his name, including the claim that Israel intentionally targeted civilians “as a matter of policy.”

Wow! That’s the only possible reaction. The Goldstone report, released on September 15, 2009, concluded that both Israel and Hamas had committed war crimes by intentionally targeting civilians. The committee did not receive information from Israel that would have contradicted these conclusions because the Israeli government refused to cooperate with members of the fact-finding mission.

Now the South African jurist says that if he had known that Israel would later investigate  soldiers on suspicion of having intentionally targeted civilians, he would not have previously concluded that the Israeli military may have had a policy of intentionally targeting civilians.

Given how widely the Goldstone Report has been used to demonise Israel this is nothing short of sensational. But don’t expect any of the groups that so used the report to repent. Most indulge in conspiracy theories about the pressure they think Goldstone has been under. Al Jazeera takes comfort in the fact that “Goldstone does not speak for the entire fact-finding mission.” Perhaps. But the report was called the Goldstone Report because it traded on his name and legitimacy.