Who Are You, Mr. Goldstone?

The US House of Representatives has rejected as "irredeemably biased" the findings of a UN-sponsored report which says Israel committed "war crimes" during its last military operation in the Gaza Strip (code named "Cast Lead").

The report, also known as "Goldstone Report", named after Richard Goldstone, a South African judge who headed the panel, accused Israel and (to a much lesser extent, the Hamas terrorist group) of war crimes during the 22-day conflict in December and January 2007-2008. It has been characterized as "a distorted picture" by Steny Hoyer, the Democrat House majority leader. Steven Rothman, a Democratic congressman from New Jersey said that the report "was not written to talk about 12,000 rockets intentionally sent by Hamas to slaughter Israeli men, women and children, versus the Israelis trying in many respects to minimize the damage to Palestinian civilians."

Israel refused to collaborate with the biased "investigation" and around the world, many voices were heard in defense of Israel and the IDF ("IDF is the most moral army in the history of warfare"). But many others took the opportunity to lash out against Israel and to use the conclusions of the report in order to further their anti-Israel (and often anti-Semitic) agenda, using charges of "war crimes" against the Jewish State.

Goldstone maintains his objectivity and impartiality. A recent article in the Israeli daily "Israel Ha'Yom", however, uncovers another side of Mr. Goldstone....

It seems that the "impartial" and "objective" judge Goldstone is anything but. According to the "Im Tirtzu" group, Goldstone was a member of the "International Center for Transitional Justice", a far left group masquerading as working "to redress and prevent the most severe violations of human rights", but has a history of accusing Israel of some of the worst abuses of human rights. On its website, the group quotes Goldstone as lamenting that he cannot understand how "Jews can act with racism".

Goldstone served in the Board of Directors of "Human Rights Watch" (although his name was removed from the organization's website after the group "Monitor NGO" publicized the judge's links with HRW). In its March 2009 report, HRW accuses Israel of "war crimes" during its "Cast Lead" operation in Gaza.

Today, Goldstone belongs to "Doctors for Human Rights", another self proclaimed global human rights organization which has a history of accusing Israel in the past of "violations of international human rights".

Impartial and objective? Goldstone's bias and lies are shameful to the very least.