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Amal Alamuddin, George Clooney’s Fiancée, Turns Down Spot on UN War Crimes Panel on Gaza
The Israelis have one less thing to worry about: George Clooney’s glamorous girlfriend.
A few hours after the United Nations announced that Amal Alamuddin would be part of the team investigating Israel for possible war crimes in Gaza, the British legal eagle said thanks but no thanks.
“I was contacted by the UN about this for the first time this morning,” the future Mrs. Clooney said in a statement. “I am honored to have received the offer, but given existing commitments — including eight ongoing cases — unfortunately could not accept this role.”
She’s also got a September wedding to plan.
Alamuddin was tapped to serve on a three-person commission looking into whether the Israelis deliberately targeted civilians when they invaded Gaza to crush Hamas.
Saying that she is “horrified by the situation in the occupied Gaza Strip, particularly the civilian casualties that have been caused,” Alamuddin said in her statement she believes “that there should be an independent investigation and accountability for crimes that have been committed.”
The UN’s Human Rights Council has already passed a resolution condemning the Israeli bombardment, which resulted in the deaths of more than 1,900 Palestinians — the vast majority of them civilians.
The Israelis have lost 67 people, most of them soldiers. They deny deliberately killing civilians and have accused Hamas of using their own people as human shields.
Alamuddin, an alum of the NYU School of Law who once worked as a student law clerk for now-Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, became the object of international envy in April when it was revealed that she and one of the world’s most eligible bachelors were engaged.
While Alamuddin, 36, was new to the gossip pages, she was no stranger to high stakes international law.
The raven-haired beauty was the legal adviser to the prosecutor of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon. And she represented big fish like WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko.
Alamuddin was born in Lebanon and speaks Arabic, but she left for England as a child and has spent most of her life in London.
The brief brush between Hollywood and Hamas came as Israeli and Palestinian negotiators in Cairo tried again to hammer out an agreement to end the bloody month-long war.
So far the Egyptian-brokered truce appears to be holding.
The first attempt to reach a deal fell apart after Hamas resumed their rocket attacks on the Jewish state.
Israel wants Gaza demilitarized and Hamas defanged.
Hamas, a radical Islamic party that runs the Palestinian territory and which the U.S. considers a terrorist group, is seeking an end to the eight-year-old economic blockade of Gaza.
Corky Siemaszko
NY Daily News