Both sides in the ongoing Gaza siege met a February 5, 2010 deadline set by the United Nations General Assembly, to show that they had conducted legitimate war crimes investigations on their own. Absent credible investigations, Hamas and Israel may have to answer Gaza war crimes charges at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. The charges are contained in the Goldstone Report, officially titled the Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict.

The report concludes that Israel used disproportionate force in violation of the Law of Land Warfare. Israeli forces deliberately targeted civilians, used civilians as human shields, and destroyed civilian infrastructure during their incursion into the Gaza Strip from December 27, 2008 to January 18, 2009. The report also accused Palestinian armed groups including Hamas of deliberately targeting civilians and trying to spread terror through rocket attacks on southern Israel.

Israeli Information and Diaspora Minister Yuli Edelstein met with U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on January 25, and rejected the idea of an independent verification commission to document war crimes described in the Goldstone Report. “This type of report stirs up anti-Semitism and reinforces those who deny the Holocaust,” Edelstein said.

The latest flap seems to be over whether the Hamas response to the United Nations contained an apology for the deaths of three Israeli civilians caused by homemade rockets. The Israeli government expressed outrage at the insincerity of what they thought was an apology, while Hamas officials denied that any apology had been offered in the first place. Of course, nobody has asked if Israel is willing to apologize for killing 1,417 Palestinian noncombatants, including an estimated 400 children.

Both sides presented documents to the UN in recent days which they say showed they had conducted suitable investigations. In a message on Thursday to the General Assembly, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon withheld judgment on whether either party had met Goldstone’s recommendations.

UN member states “will consult on the further course of action,” General Assembly spokesman Jean Victor Nkolo said.

Rights group Amnesty International called Ban’s message “deeply disappointing.”

“Amnesty International believes that the information [Ban] had received was sufficient to show clearly that the steps taken by both sides have been completely inadequate,” it said in a statement.

Stay tuned. Will the Secretary General muster the courage to send this case to The Hague? The world is watching.

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Gaza War Crimes Report Referred to U.N. Security Council (October 16, 2009)