[Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs] An internal UN inspection committee will report Tuesday on nine UN installations which were damaged during Israel's recent operation in Gaza. Immediately upon the conclusion of the Gaza operation, and unrelated to the UN investigation, Israel carried out independent inquiries into the damage caused to the UN installations. The findings of these inquiries, published two weeks ago, proved beyond doubt that the IDF did not intentionally fire at the UN installations. The State of Israel rejects the criticism in the committee's summary report, and determines that in both spirit and language, the report is tendentious, patently biased, and ignores the facts presented to the committee. The committee has preferred the claims of Hamas, a murderous terror organization, and by doing so has misled the world. During the course of its work, the committee met with the Israeli team, which cooperated fully and presented various intelligence materials, including videos, aerial photographs, eye-witness reports and other material. None of this information is reflected in the report. The UN report completely ignores the eight years of attacks against Israel that preceded the decision to initiate the operation. It ignores how Hamas chose to put the lives of Palestinian civilians at risk and cynically and manipulatively used them as human shields. The IDF took precautions to prevent damage to installations and vehicles belonging to the UN and other international organizations. Surprisingly, the report lays no responsibility on Hamas, which placed its installations and dispatched its men to confront the IDF in proximity to the UN installations.
2009-05-05 06:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive