by Stephen Lendman

The whole world knows Israel committed horrific war crimes last summer against 1.8 million largely defenseless Gazans - even greater ones than it was condemned for in 2008-09 and 2012.

UNHCR's Commission of Inquiry (COI) held top Israeli government and military officials accountable for mass murdering Gazan civilians threatening no one.

COI chairwoman Mary McGowan Davis said "the extent of the devastation and human suffering…was unprecedented and will impact generations to come."

Nuremberg Principles apply but aren't enforced for rogue states like Israel and America - repeatedly committing mass murder and destruction with impunity because nothing is done to stop them. Operation Protective Edge was premeditated naked aggression. It had nothing to do with Hamas rockets or bogus claims about it being a terrorist organization.

It had everything to do with preventing Palestinian statehood and maintaining brutal, illegal military occupation, among other objectives.

Civilians were indiscriminately killed in high density populated areas. Dozens of entire families were mercilessly slaughtered.

On Friday, the HRC adopted a resolution approving its report condemning Israel for war crimes last summer. Washington alone voted against it - de facto endorsing Israeli mass murder, the same type US forces commit on a much greater scale globally.

Five nations disgracefully abstained - Ethiopia, India, Kenya, Macedonia and Paraguay. Major countries endorsing HCR's resolution included Brazil, Britain, China, France, Germany, Japan, and Russia. It passed 41 to 1.

Drafted by Arab countries, it states "the need to ensure that all those responsible for violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law are held to account, through appropriate fair and independent domestic or international criminal justice mechanisms."

It called on "the parties concerned to cooperate fully with the preliminary examination of the International Criminal Court and with any subsequent investigation that may be opened."

Unindicted war criminal Netanyahu responded as expected saying "(t)he UN Human Rights Council is not interested in the facts and is really not interested in human rights."

"The UNHCR decides to condemn Israel for no fault of its own, for acting to defend itself from a murderous terrorist organization."

"The council that has adopted more decisions against Israel than against all other countries cannot call itself a human rights council."

Earlier Israel's Foreign Ministry lied saying its "military acted according to the highest international standards." Nothing in them justifies mass murder - an Israeli specialty.

Its UN ambassador in Geneva Eviator Manor said HRC's resolution "is an anti-Israeli manifesto. (It) distorts the intention of the authors of the report by completely ignoring alleged violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law committed by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups."

Fact: Hamas and Palestinian resistance groups violated no international laws with regard to war.

HRC claiming otherwise in its report (not resolution) ignored the right of all attacked people to respond in self-defense. Israel preemptively waged naked aggression against Gaza last summer.

Washington's UN ambassador in Geneva Keith Harper said "(w)e are troubled that this resolution focuses exclusively on Israel."

US officials should be especially troubled about their nation's odious history of horrendous genocidal crimes of war and against humanity since the republic's inception.

Palestinian UN ambassador in Geneva Ibrahim Khraishi welcomed HRC's resolution saying it shows how "Israel stands above international law…"

Human Rights Watch executive director Kenneth Roth said America "stands embarrassing alone (41 - 1) in opposing the UN rights council resolution urging justice for (Israeli committed) Gaza war crimes." One rogue state supports another.

On April 1, Palestine became an ICC member. In June, its Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki filed war crimes charges in the Hague over Israel's 2014 Gaza aggression and illegal settlements.

Chief ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda will use them in determining if a full investigation is warranted - a decision ICC pretrial department judges make.

Established in July 2002 to prosecute individuals for genocide, crimes of war and against humanity, court authorities never once charged Western or Israeli officials with high crimes too grave to ignore. Expect nothing different this time.

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Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks World War III".

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

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