WASHINGTON (JTA) — The U.N. Security Council decided it will not hold a special session to discuss the Goldstone report on the 2009 Gaza war.
However, the council agreed late Wednesday to move up its next monthly meeting by a week, to Oct. 14, and said members may discuss the Goldstone report then.
The meeting Wednesday to consider holding a special session came at Libya’s request to address outrage in the Arab world at the decision of the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva to defer a vote until next March on a resolution endorsing the report.
Israel and the United States reportedly pressed the Palestinians to back a delay.
Israel, which considers the Goldstone report biased, reportedly warned the Palestinians that a vote in Geneva endorsing the report would have grave consequences for U.S.-sponsored Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations.
The report, written by a council of legal experts led by South African jurist Richard Goldstone, accuses Israel and Hamas of committing war crimes during Israel’s military operation in Gaza last December and January.
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