国际英语新闻：UN committee starts assessing postwar queries in Gaza

GAZA, Aug. 15 (Xinhua) -- A committee of independent experts, tasked by the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC), started on Sunday meetings and tours in the Gaza Strip to assess postwar investigations by concerning parties to the conflict.

The committee arrived in Gaza on Saturday, planned to spend three days seeing Palestinian victims of the Israeli military operation that took place between December 2008 and January 2009.

The committee's mandate is to see how the West Bank-based Palestinian National Authority (PNA), the Hamas movement and Israel deal with the recommendations of a UN fact-finding mission led by South African Justice Richard Goldstone.

In Gaza, the committee started its work by meeting representatives from local rights groups and families whose cases were raised in the Goldstone's report.

Raji al-Sourani, director of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), said his foundation had showed the committee " hundreds of cases of Palestinian victims whom Israel refused to investigate or tried to compensate."

About 1,400 Palestinians were killed in the three-week offensive and tens of thousands of houses suffered various degrees of damage. On the other side, three Israeli civilians were killed by rockets Hamas fired from Gaza.

The Goldstone report found that Israel and Hamas committed war crimes and possible crimes against humanity.