Israeli human rights community to Prime Minister Netanyahu: Establish independent inquiry into Operation Cast Lead

On Tuesday, January 26, nine human-rights organizations in Israel re-issued a call to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, asking him to, "establish, without delay, an independent and impartial investigation mechanism to thoroughly examine the allegations raised regarding violations of international law during Operation Cast Lead" - the Gaza war of December '08-January '09.

The organizations - Adalah, Association for Civil Rights in Israel, B'Tselem, Gisha, HaMoked, Physicians for Human Rights - Israel, Public Committee Against Torture in Israel, Rabbis for Human Rights, and Yesh Din - encouraged Israel's government to authorize such an investigation before the matter is turned over to international bodies.

The organizations' letter stresses that internal investigations by the IDF are an insufficient response, since these would only examine whether soldiers had violated orders, not whether the orders themselves constituted human rights violations.

The press release issued by the organizations can be read here.
The full letter to the Prime Minister is available here.