A UN report on Israel's 22-day offensive against Hamas-controlled Gaza is anti-Semitic, an Israeli government minister said, as the Jewish state prepares to formally respond to its allegations of war crimes.
"The Goldstone Report ... and similar reports, are simply a type of anti-Semitism," Diaspora and Information Minister Yuli Edelstein told the YNet news agency ahead of a trip to New York, where he will present Israel's rebuttal on Thursday. YNet's report suggested the Israeli leadership is planning an all-out attack on the report to coincide with Wednesday's anniversary of the 1945 liberation of Auschwitz.
"The connection between the Goldstone Report and the international Holocaust memorial day is not an easy thing. On the other hand, however, we must learn the lessons from what happened," Edelstein said. "Then too, those who yelled out were told that Hitler is a clown and that all the gloomy predictions of the 1930s were nonsense," he added.
Israel has sought to discredit the UN report since its release in September, denouncing it as anti-Semitic even though its lead author, South African judge and international war crimes prosecutor Richard Goldstone, is Jewish. (AFP)