Besides rampant inaccuracies and the fact that it didn’t really examine the actions of Hamas, one of the main reasons that supporters of Israel have been so critical of the Goldstone Report is that Israel already has military and civilian courts that are responsible for monitoring any misbehavior in the IDF.
In fact, the IDF itself investigated 36 cases of possible misbehavior among its troops during last year’s Operation Cast Lead, the incursion into Hamas-controlled Gaza to stop rocketfire targeting Israeli civilians. Most have been investigated and dismissed, but, last week, IDF investigators moved forward in charging two soldiers with the horrific act of using a 9-year-old boy as a human shield.
The two soldiers, staff sargeants from the prestigious Givati brigade, had the boy open sacks they thought might be booby-trapped with explosives. (The bags, thankfully, turned out to be harmless.)
Haaretz reported that the soldiers, “who breached the army’s rule against using civilians as human shields during war, will be tried for violating their authority and for inappropriate conduct. An Israeli military official said the soldiers could face up to three years in jail.”
Two other Givati soldiers have already been charged with using a credit card they found during the siege.
Yediot Aharonot reports:
More than 30 probes have been launched against soldiers since the Gaza offensive ended in the beginning of 2009. Half of the cases have been closed by the military prosecution, while the other half are nearing their termination and await a decision on whether indictments will be filed.
A special team led by Lieutenant-Colonel Gil Maoz, who heads the military police’s southern district, is conducting investigations into claims regarding unlawful fire, injuring and endangering of innocent civilians, and disobeying orders.
Dozens of officers and soldiers have been summoned to give testimony or receive warning at the military police’s headquarters in recent months, some of them already having been discharged from the IDF.
A military official said the testimonies had revealed other infractions, some committed by commanders. “In places where the incident exceeds the boundaries of reason we will file indictments,” he said.
“But we can clearly state that we are talking about a number of specific incidents, some of them serious and others not, and not about lawlessness in relation to war crimes and the like.”
We can only wish godspeed to the investigators. The IDF’s code of ethics is second-to-none, and soldiers who violate it bring shame on themselves and their compatriots, and do not deserve the honor of serving.