Raise the Hammer

Interseting facts on the Kahan commision.Not s black and white as you make it out to be:

The Kahan Commission (ועדת כהן), formally known as the Commission of Inquiry into the Events at the Refugee Camps in Beirut, was established by the Israeli government on 28 September 1982, to investigate the Sabra and Shatila Massacre (16 September-18 September, 1982). The Kahan Commission was chaired by the President of the Supreme Court, Yitzhak Kahan. Its other two members were Supreme Court Judge Aharon Barak, and Major-General (res.) Yona Erfat.

The Commission was to make recommendations on Israeli involvement in the massacre through an investigation of:

[A]ll the facts and factors connected with the atrocity carried out by a unit of the Lebanese Forces against the civilian population in the Shatilla and Sabra camps.
Following its investigation, on 8 February 1983, the Kahan Commission submitted its report. It concluded that direct responsibility rested with the Jemayel Phalangists led by Fadi Frem. Israeli forces were deemed indirectly responsible. Defence Minister, Ariel Sharon, was found to be personally responsible. Sharon's negligence (that is, complacency not complicity, the Commission maintained) amounted to a non-fulfillment of a duty with which the Defense Minister was charged, and it was recommended that Sharon be dismissed as Defence Minister, which he was. The Commission arrived to similar conclusions with respect to Chief of Staff, Lt. Gen. Rafael Eitan (tantamount to a breach of duty that was incumbent upon the Chief of Staff), as well as Director of Military Intelligence, Maj. Gen. Yehoshua Saguy, and other Intelligence officials — though the Mossad was not reprimanded and parts of the report commenting on its role remain under military censorship. Critics of the Commission point to its limited scope, some of whom argue it amounted to a whitewash. However, members of the commission stood by their conclusions and protested of their integrity, as stated in the concluding paragraph of their report: "We do not deceive ourselves that the results of this inquiry will convince or satisfy those who have prejudices or selective consciences, but this inquiry was not intended for such people. We have striven and have spared no effort to arrive at the truth, and we hope that all persons of good will who will examine the issue without prejudice will be convinced that the inquiry was conducted without any bias."

So lets not let the FACTS get in the way eh?
The "War Crimes" were carried out by the Phalangist party with the Iraeli forces indirectly responsible and Ariel Sharon Negligent...

"The massacre received much attention from the world media. According to Bernard Lewis(A supporter of the Jewish Zionist movement):

Characteristic features were the suspension of critical thinking by journalists who normally exercise a salutary skepticism; unhesitating acceptance and publication of what soon proved to be self-evident propaganda from partisan sources. Most striking and revealing, was the frequent usage of language evocative of the Nazis... Such words as "blitzkrieg", "lebensraum", "genocide", and "final solution" were freely used to reinforce the comparison, sometimes stated and often implied, between Israelis in Lebanon and the Nazis in conquered and occupied Europe... Most reports concentrated their whole attack on the Israelis who, as was known from the start, had not actually participated in the massacre and whose negligence or complicity had not yet been established, and almost failed to mention the Lebanese Christian militias who actually did the deed. The careless reader or viewer could have got the impression that this was a massacre unique in the modern history of the Middle East, and that it was perpetrated directly by the Israelis. Neither was true."

Citing Sabra and Shatila as an example, Leo Kuper notes the reluctance of the United Nations to respond or take action in actual cases of genocide for most egregious violators, but its willingness to charge "certain vilified states, and notably Israel", with genocide. In his view:

This availability of a scapegoat state in the UN restores members with a record of murderous violence against their subjects a self-righteous sense of moral purpose as principled members of 'the community of nations'... Estimates of the numbers killed in the Sabra-Shatila massacres range from about four hundred to eight hundred - a minor catastrophe in the contemporary statistics of mass murder. Yet a carefully planned UN campaign found Israel guilty of genocide, without reference to the role of the Phalangists in perpetrating the massacres on their own initiative. The procedures were unique in the annals of the United Nations"


So Ryan, lets not use the term "War Crimes" and "Israel" so loosly in one short paragraph.Those directly responsible ae responsible abd those indirectly responsible are indirectly responsible.