Matt McCarten: Egg on face silences Georgia's apologists

Refreshingly, there have been a couple of international investigative reports this week that have spoken truth to power.

You may recall, during last year's US presidential campaign, the Republican candidate John McCain lambasted his opponent, Barack Obama, for not automatically championing Georgia when Russia invaded South Ossetia.

At the time, Russia claimed - to a disbelieving international news media - it was actually Georgia which had attacked Ossetia, killing hundreds of people.

Most television stations throughout the world had wall-to-wall coverage of the Western-backed, photogenic Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili pleading for international intervention to save his country from Russian aggression. Dutifully, Western nations fell into line, isolating Russia and even threatening to move troops into Georgia. The Bush administration strongly advocated for the inclusion of Georgia into NATO as a buttress to the so-called Russian bear. But anyone who had a cursory interest in the truth could see it was the Georgians who had initiated the conflict in Ossetia.

A European Union report published this week found Saakashvili had ordered his artillery to shell the main towns, killing at least 200 civilians and Russian peacekeepers also stationed there. I presume Saakashvili timed his attack to coincide with the Olympic Games, assuming Russian President Vladimir Putin - who was at the Games - would back down, not wanting to get offside with all the other world leaders present. Saakashvili had clearly misjudged the situation.

The report found Russia was justified in sending troops into South Ossetia, although judged Russia should not have invaded other parts of Georgia. Quite frankly, Saakashvili got off lightly and he's lucky the Russians didn't insist on indicting him as a war criminal.

But it's interesting the same international press agencies that demanded support for Georgia are silent now the truth has come out.

The other published report of significance this week was the long-awaited UN inquiry into the Israeli invasion of Gaza, headed by respected South African judge, Richard Goldstone. Goldstone's findings were almost identical to those in an earlier Amnesty International report which found whilst the Palestinian organisation Hamas had committed isolated crimes, Israel was responsible for more serious deliberate atrocities against civilians. In the past, Israel dismissed criticisms of its actions by claiming bias and even going so far as to use anti-Semitism to cover up its wrongdoing. This time this tactic won't work because Goldstone is Jewish and only agreed to take on the inquiry on the basis any investigation would be impartial. The reactions have been interesting. Hamas has agreed to co-operate with any further investigations to identify and punish guilty parties. Yet Israel, once more, claims the report is biased and refuses to accept it has done anything wrong.

Where once the world's sympathy was with the Jewish state, their constant refusal to admit any wrongdoing over its treatment of Palestinians is even exasperating their own supporters. Building walls around the Palestinian people and pretending that they don't exist will ultimately fail in the same way that the apartheid state did in South Africa.

Portraying Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, as some sort of bogeyman intent on building a nuclear bomb to wipe out Israel proves a useful political distraction.

However, the premise is farcical given Israel has the world's fourth-biggest military with almost 100 nuclear warheads - capable of obliterating the entire Middle East. If we are hysterical of an erratic Muslim regime having nuclear weapons then look no further than American ally, Pakistan. They have real terrorists who really do want to get their hands on the country's nuclear bombs. Although inconvenient to those in power, it is reassuring there are still individuals with integrity who are prepared to expose deceit propagated by various governments and spread by some of our international press agencies as fact.