How Big of a Dupe is Richard Goldstone?

Written by David Frum on Saturday April 2, 2011

Why is Richard Goldstone surprised that the UN has not condemned Hamas's terrorist attacks?

Is Richard Goldstone the world's biggest dupe? If he does not deserve the gold medal, surely he's a solid runner-up.

Some have suggested that it was absurd to expect Hamas, an organization that has a policy to destroy the state of Israel, to investigate what we said were serious war crimes. It was my hope, even if unrealistic, that Hamas would do so, especially if Israel conducted its own investigations. At minimum I hoped that in the face of a clear finding that its members were committing serious war crimes, Hamas would curtail its attacks. Sadly, that has not been the case. Hundreds more rockets and mortar rounds have been directed at civilian targets in southern Israel. That comparatively few Israelis have been killed by the unlawful rocket and mortar attacks from Gaza in no way minimizes the criminality. The U.N. Human Rights Council should condemn these heinous acts in the strongest terms.

In the end, asking Hamas to investigate may have been a mistaken enterprise. So, too, the Human Rights Council should condemn the inexcusable and cold-blooded recent slaughter of a young Israeli couple and three of their small children in their beds.

That's the same Human Rights Council that welcomed Libya as a member until about 27 minutes ago.

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