The International Court of Justice, Foggy Bottom Division

Caroline Glick of the Jerusalem Post wonders “How is it that, after three and a half years of absorbing massacre after massacre, Israel now finds itself on trial” at the Hague? Glick thinks that “the answer to this question is found in part in the latest State Department Human Rights Report.” The report, “aside from condemning every action Israel has taken to combat terrorism and thereby equating actions aimed at protecting Israeli citizens with terrorism, something even more offensive. [It] very sensitively gives the names of a dozen or so Palestinian children who died during Israeli assaults against Palestinian terrorists who used these children for cover. Yet, grotesquely, while the names of Palestinian children are listed, the report provides not one name of any Israeli victim of Palestinian terrorism.”
Glick’s description of the State Department’s report, as well as related developments regarding the Hague proceeding and the fence, left me feeling quite depressed. If there’s a silver lining, though, it’s the realization the State Department cannot maintain even the appearance of being an honest broker with respect to Israeli security. One hopes, therefore, that, to the extent possible, Israel will view Foggy Bottom’s actions and pronouncements the same way it views those of the “International Court of Justice” at the Hague. There really isn’t much difference between the two institutions, at least when it comes to Israel.