by Fares Akram

    GAZA, Oct. 8 (Xinhua) -- Islamic Hamas movement started preparing "legal responses" to its accusations in a UN fact-finding mission's report about Israel's last winter war in the Gaza Strip, officials said on Thursday.

    The report by South African Justice Richard Goldstone "was not built on true information regarding Hamas" which controls Gaza, said Mushier al-Massri, a Hamas lawmaker.

    The 575-page report accused Israel of committing war crimes during its December 27 to January 18 war and also said that Hamas' rocket attacks on southern Israel communities violated laws of war.

    Al-Massri told Xinhua that a team of legal experts and other leaders from Hamas is working "to present clarifications to Goldstone's committee because its members have not had complete information."

    Mahmoud Zahar, a senior Hamas leader and a member of the legal committee, told reporters that "the committee "will send its answers to the judge Goldstone as soon as they are ready."

    "The committee will put evidences that prove the opposite to Hamas' and the resistance factions' accusations," Zahar said.

    He added that the Hamas experts "will base their evidences on other international reports by rights groups, such Human Rights Watch (HRW) which denied that Hamas militants have used civilians as human shields."

    Zahar was referring to the New York-based rights organization which in March said that there was no evidence of Hamas using human shields in the vicinity at the time of Israeli attacks in various parts of Gaza. In a later report, HRW has clearly said that Hamas' rocket attacks on Israel amounted to war crimes.

    Meanwhile, Zahar referred to the Israeli bombing of a UN school in Jabaliya refugee camp, defending his movement. From the 35 people who were killed on Jan. 6 attack on al-Fakhoura school, "there was no militant and no fighter was registered" among the casualties. "If Hamas was using the residents as shields, militants would have been killed in that attack."

    Though the Goldstone report does not exclude Israeli allegations that the army fired at the school, which was sheltering about 1,300 people, in response to Palestinian rocket attacks form the area, it considered "the credibility of Israel's position damaged by the series of inconsistencies, contradictions and factual inaccuracies in the statements justifying the attack."

    The Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) was set to vote on the Goldstone's report on Oct. 2 but it has delayed the voting to its next session in March 2010.

    The Palestinian National Authority's (PNA) support to the postponement has outraged many Palestinians, including Hamas.

Special Report: Palestine-Israel Conflicts