[JURIST] The United Nations General Assembly voted Friday to give the Israelis and Palestinians additional time to finish their separate investigations into alleged human rights violations that took place during the 2008-2009 conflict in Gaza. The measure, which gives the two parties five additional months, was opposed by Israel and the US. While permanent Palestinian observer to the UN Riyad Mansour called the resolution a “victory”, Israeli Ambassador Gabriela Shalev questioned the impartiality of the Palestinian investigation as it would be carried out by Hamas. Meanwhile, US Ambassador Alejandro Wolff voted against the measure because Israel had already submitted a detailed report to the General Assembly, and because he said the resolution was inherently biased against Israel. He claimed the original UN fact-finding report on the Gaza conflict, the Goldstone report, was similarly biased.
Earlier this month, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said it was unclear if Israel and the Palestinians had fully met UN demands to investigate war crimes that may have taken place during the Gaza conflict. In November 2009, the UN had originally adopted a resolution giving the two parties three months to complete an independent investigation. According to the Goldstone report, which was officially endorsed by the UN in October, both Israel and Hamas committed human rights violations during the Gaza conflict. Both Israel and the US criticized the report. An internal Israel military investigation found that no war crimes had been committed during the conflict, but Israel recently disciplined two high-ranking officers for firing shells into a populated area of the Gaza strip.