The United Nations fact-finding report on Gaza that found evidence of both Israeli and Palestinian war crimes is to be raised next week at the UN Security Council, following a request from Libya.

Libya is a permanent member of the UN Security Council. In an effort to maintain the momentum of the report, which reproted on allegations of war crimes by both the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) and Palestinian groups, Libya's deputy ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi told AFP that his country had circulated a letter on behalf of the UN Arab group requesting "an emergency meeting" of the 15-member UN Security Council to discuss the report.
 

Compromise

A compromise was reached in a closed-door meeting of the Security Council when members agreed to move the regular monthly debate on the Middle East from 20 October to 14 October.  
 

The current chair of the 22-member UN Arab group, Sudanese Ambassador Abdalmahmood Abdalhaleem Mohamad, said the group decided that the Goldstone report "should be operationalized and should not be sidelined." He also warned that failure by the UN Human Rights Council to implement the report's recommendations would force the Arab group to take the issue to the UN General Assembly.
 

Human Rights Council deferral
The Goldstone report, which was presented to the Human Rights Council on 29 September, has both its supporters and detractors. The Council subsequently decided to postpone a vote on the report until March 2010 following American pressure to get stalled peace talks between Israel and Palestine back on track. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has also come under sharp criticism at home for agreeing to the delay, an accusation he denies.
 

Ian Kelly, US State Department spokesman, said such a delay could help contribute to creating an atmosphere favourable to dialogue. He added, "All of our energies right now are being employed to move this process forward, and we want to clear the decks of any issues that might impede our progress towards this."