President Shimon Peres said Thursday that the state of Israel would not allow a “hostile majority” of anti-Israel countries to judge the army's decisions in fighting terrorism. Peres made his statement at a meeting with Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero.
Regarding the Goldstone Report on the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza in 2008-2009, which accused Israel of war crimes, Peres told Zapatero that Israel would not tolerate the UN's attempts to judge the IDF. “We do not need outside judges. We will not allow a majority that is hostile to Israel to judge us,” he said.
"A judicial tribunal must be beyond reproach, and there is no doubt that the Arab League and opponents of Israel have a majority on the Council,” he explained. If the UN's Human Rights Council wants to take a balanced approach, it should investigate Iran, which has called for Israel's destruction, he added.
Peres noted that while Goldstone and others have criticized Israel's approach in fighting terrorism, they have not offered alternative solutions. The UN has a code of conduct for cases of classical warfare, he said, but no such code when it comes to fighting terrorists, who attack while using civilians as human shields.
Peres and Zapatero also discussed Israel's talks with the Palestinian Authority and Israel-Spanish ties.