A children's mock court in Gaza sentenced President Mahmoud Abbas to life in prison and removed him from office for the crime of delaying international action on a United Nations report on war crimes.This Hamas version of a show trial is of course meant for Hamas to score political points against Fatah, but it also shows clearly that Hamas is not frightened at all about any repercussions that it might suffer from the Goldstone Report.
This latest expression of public outrage at Abbas was staged by the Palestinian Child Parliament, an organization said to be linked to Hamas.
In early October Abbas’ envoy withdrew a motion from the UN Human Rights Council calling for further action on Judge Richard Goldstone’s report on Israel’s winter assault on Gaza which left more than 1,400 Palestinians dead. Palestinians have been outraged over the decision.
During the mock trial a child acting as “prosecutor” in the trial said Abbas was charged under Palestinian law with the crime of “high treason to the Palestinian people’s interests” under the Palestinian Basic Law and the Penal Code.
“Abbas insisted on withdrawing the resolution, despite support from 33 countries for report and this would clearly condemn Israel," the prosecutor said.
The judge then heard arguments from human rights organizations who explained their efforts to compile and propose the report, and their shock when it was withdrawn from the Human Rights Council.
Because it would not suffer any.
Hamas initially criticized the Goldstone Commission because it was led by a "Zionist" and it felt that the cards were stacked against it. Now that the report was released, Hamas is secure in the knowledge that the report is one-sided against Israel, despite Goldstone's insistence that he looked at Hamas crimes as carefully as he looked at alleged Israeli crimes.