Ha'aretz
> Friday, June 22, 2001
>
>
> Eye of the Beholder
>
> A salutary dose of international law
>
> Besides Sabra and Chatila, Ariel Sharon also has to account for the
> appointments of Carmi Gillon and Ehud Yatom
>
> By Tom Segev
>
>
> The minutes from the cabinet meeting on the evening of September 16, 1982
> record comments by Minister David Levy after the IDF conquered West Beirut
> and the Phalangists entered the Chatila refugee camp. Israel was about to
> claim that the Phalangists were allowed to enter the Palestinian camps so
> as
> to restore order there. Levy said that nobody would believe Israel: there
> will be a slaughter, he predicted, "and the guilt will be ours.".While
Levy
>
> didn't oppose the IDF's entry into West Beirut, he anticipated what
> happened
> this week in BBC's "Panorama" segment, "The Accused." As Levy put it, "our
> claim won't stand up."
>
> The Kahan Commission, which investigated the Sabra and Chatila massacre,
> determined that Ariel Sharon was not fit to serve as defense minister. It
> is
> self-evident that he is unfit to serve in a still higher-level, executive,
> capacity. The commission's finding was a political-moral injunction, not a
> legal or constitutional one. Most Israelis ignored it when they elected
> Sharon prime minister.
>
> The Kahan Commission attributed "personal responsibility" for the Sabra
and
>
> Chatila massacre to Sharon because he ignored the danger that a massacre
> might occur, and failed to take the steps needed to prevent it. These
> failures represented "non-fulfillment of the obligation he had as defense
> minister," the Kahan Commission wrote.
>
> "Panorama," which relied on the Kahan Commission report, did not disclose
> new
> facts. The BBC segment wasn't an investigative report. It was a reminder.
>
> Such a reminder was appropriate, but not only because of Sharon's past.
Its
>
> pertinence is underscored by his desire to appoint as his anti-terror
> advisor
> Ehud Yatom, who confessed to killing two terrorists with his own hands in
> the
> Bus 300 affair. And Sharon deserves the broadcast because he has appointed
> Carmi Gillon to serve as Israel's ambassador to Denmark. Gillon, a former
> head of the Shin Bet security service, wrote proudly in his recent memoir
> about how suspects were tortured according to his directives.
>
> Israel deserves the "Panorama" segment because this country frequently
> violates Palestinians' human rights without operational justification for
> doing so, and only rarely indicts the perpetrators of these violations.
> Though international law is a far cry from what the program's producers
> might
> want, its main thrust is salutary for all countries, Israel included.
>
> What was described this week as the most important investigative program
> broadcast by the most important network resembled contrived dramas
conjured
>
> up by Ilana Dayan's "Fact" program on Channel Two. In order to guarantee
> that
> BBC viewers would fully grasp that a massacre of civilians is a bad thing,
> one witness after another was rolled out in front of the camera to talk
> about
> what was done to residents in the camps, including instances of brutal
> physical abuse and rape.
>
> In order to ensure that viewers would understand that the Phalangist
> commander who presided over the massacre, Eli Hobeika, was very bad, the
> camera zoomed up and caught his eyes, again and again. Despite this camera
> work, the interviewers didn't give him a hard time. Hobeika lives in
> Beirut;
> the producers didn't ask the Lebanese government spokesman why he isn't
put
>
> on trial.
>
> In order to make clear to viewers that Israel shirks moral responsibility
> for
> the massacre, the program broadcast (apparently, with glee) heaps of
> statements made by Sharon's spokesman, Ra'anan Gissin. The prime
minister's
>
> mouthpiece has a grating, American-inflected voice; he has a tendency to
> raise his voice, and he seems to think that 20 years after the massacre
> Israel still needs to justify its part in what transpired, and also
> Sharon's
> role. To acquit himself well in his role as an Israeli spokesman, he would
> say in a soft, calm voice that this is one of the most sorrowful incidents
> in
> the history of the dispute; it was investigated thoroughly, and as a
> government spokesman he has nothing to add to the Kahan Commission's
> conclusions. Gissin's woeful appearance on the broadcast perhaps furnishes
> a
> partial explanation as to why Israel's response to the program was so
> hysterical, both before the segment was shown and afterward. In one of the
> nonsensical discussions shown on television in response to the BBC
program,
>
> somebody suggested that Pope Pius XII should be put on trial
posthumously -
>
> the pontiff knew about the murder of Jews during World War II, but kept
> mum.
> And, as in the days of Menachem Begin, the insidious comparison between
the
>
> BBC and Nazi propaganda under Goebbels came up.
>
> The prospect of putting Sharon on trial as a war criminal was raised by
> Richard Falk, Professor of International Law and Practice at the Woodrow
> Wilson School, Princeton University, and Justice Richard Goldstone, former
> chief prosecutor of the United Nations Tribunal on Crimes Against Humanity
> in
> Bosnia/Croatia and Rwanda. Hedging his words very cautiously, Goldstone
did
>
> not exactly say that it would be possible to indict Sharon; yet his words
> implied that it would be just to do so.
>
> Goldstone's selection as prosecutor in the case which "Panorama" tried
> Ariel
> Sharon was rather awkward. In addition to roles as justice of the South
> Africa Constitutional Court and chancellor of the University of
> Witwatersrand, Goldstone has worked extensively for human rights and on
the
>
> formulation of international law statutes against war crimes. In tribute
to
>
> this work, he has snared countless honorary doctorates, including one from
> Hebrew University. Goldstone comes often to Jerusalem to visit family
> members. At the time of the Sabra and Chatila massacre, Goldstone was a
> justice on the Supreme Court of Transvaal; as such, he enforced racist
laws
>
> in the apartheid code. He too cannot feasibly be put on trial for this
past
>
> role.
>
> Just as a Jewish professor who believes that it is possible to put Sharon
> on
> trial as a war criminal was not hard to find, so too did the "Panorama"
> producers have an easy time finding a non-Jewish professor who propounds
> the
> opposite. The whole war crime topic is in its infancy. In recent years,
> international law has taken some strides forward; but, at least for the
> time
> being, it appears that the public denunciation of human rights violators
is
> a
> better bet than the hope that they might be arrested upon arrival, say, at
> the airport in Copenhagen.
>
> For his part, Carmi Gillon is unlikely to be detained in Copenhagen, since
> he
> will arrive with a diplomatic passport. In contrast, it appears that the
> Danish media will succeed in its effort to block his appointment as
> Israel's
> ambassador; the public committee against torture in Israel is hard at
work,
>
> assisting this Danish campaign.
>
> In his autobiography, Gillon admits that he personally permitted the
> torture
> of at least 320 suspects held by the Shin Bet. At least one suspect died
> during an interrogation authorized by Gillon. He's not exactly an emissary
> of
> a kind and gentle Israel; perhaps he would be a worthy ambassador to
> Mauritania.
>
> Copenhagen is a fine, accommodating city in which a candidate for Israel's
> ambassadorial post need not have a lengthy record of proven past
successes.
>
> Yet it's not clear why the man who bears a large share of the
> responsibility
> for the mess-up which enabled Yitzhak Rabin's assassination deserves this
> honor. At any event, blocking the Gillon appointment would send an
important warning, akin to what was broadcast by "Panorama": anyone who violates human rights, even if he does so "with authority and permission," can expect to pay a price for it sooner or later.