The Palestinian envoy in Geneva, Ibrahim Khraisha, told his Israeli counterpart Aharon Leshno Yaar that the Palestinian Authority (PA) plans to announce that it will be withdrawing its support for the adoption of the Goldstone Report during the UN Human Rights Council's vote on Friday.
The report accuses Israel and Hamas of war crimes during their conflict in Gaza in January, an allegation Israel condemns and claims is the result of bias against the Jewish state.
Leshno Yaar, who spoke with the Palestinian envoy Thursday evening, said the development proves Israel's strategy to declare that the adoption of the report may hinder the peace process was correct.
Following his recent meeting with US President Barack Obama and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in New York, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the adoption of the Goldstone Report by the UN would prevent Israel from taking any risks within the framework of the peace process, as the report would limit the Jewish state's ability to defend itself.
Netanyahu and other Israeli ministers said adopting the report would also hurt the democratic regime's war on terror.
Israel and the US have called on the PA to withdraw its support for the report.
Leshno Yaar told Ynet that Netanyahu's remarks contributed to the PA's decision, as have Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman's diplomatic efforts to "undermine this political report."
Earlier Thursday, Deputy Foreign Minister Daniel Ayalon told foreign ambassadors in Israel that approving the report will render the Human Rights Council a 'terror rights council.'
Richard J. Goldstone, the South African judge who led the inquiry into Operation Cast Lead rejected Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's claim that the report would compromise the Middle East peace process.
"I think he got wrong what our report is all about. He talked about Israel's right to self-defense. That is not what the report was about," Goldstone told reporters in Washington Thursday.
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