Israel will be vindicated, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu vowed during his weekly Cabinet meeting Sunday morning, ahead of the UN fact-finding mission’s report on the IDF’s conduct during Operation Protective Edge in Gaza. 

“We will expose the truth: that Israel has not committed war crimes,” Netanyahu said.

“We will work everywhere, for as much as it takes, to deal with false claims and anti-Israeli initiatives,” he continued. “This report shows the true facts and proves that the actions carried out by the IDF were made in accordance with international law.” 

Netanyahu’s remarks follow the publication of a report from eleven top military officials noting Israel far exceeded international standards regarding protecting civilian lives during the war. 

“Our overall findings are that during Operation Protective Edge last summer, in the air, on the ground and at sea, Israel not only met a reasonable international standard of observance of the laws of armed conflict, but in many cases significantly exceeded that standard,” the report concludes. “We saw clear evidence of this from the upper to the lower levels of command.”

“A measure of the seriousness with which Israel took its moral duties and its responsibilities under the laws of armed conflict is that in some cases Israel’s scrupulous adherence to the laws of war cost Israeli soldiers’ and civilians’ lives.”