Israel accuses head of UN probe of bias

Israel on Thursday accused the head of a UN investigation into abuses in Israel and the Palestinian territories of bias, saying it would not cooperate with the inquiry.

Navi Pillay, a former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, was appointed last July to head a high-level investigation into "all underlying root causes" in the drawn-out conflict.

In a letter addressed to Pillay released Thursday, Israel accused her of "championing an anti-Israel agenda and for numerous anti-Israel pronouncements".

Israeli foreign ministry spokesman Lior Haiat told reporters "the fact that she was appointed to this commission is actually a disgrace".

"We will not be cooperating with this commission," he added.

The comments came after UN Watch, a Geneva-based pro-Israel rights group that monitors UN activities, on Monday demanded that Pillay, a South African jurist, resign from the probe.

It accused her of having "demonstrable bias against Israel, including on issues specifically related to the case and controversy that is the object of this inquiry".

The Commission of Inquiry was created by the UN Human Rights Council last year, following the 11-day conflict between Israel and armed militants in Gaza.

It was mandated to investigate all violations of international humanitarian and human rights law in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, including Israel-annexed east Jerusalem.

Pillay served as UN rights chief from 2008 to 2014 and also served as a judge with the International Criminal Court and as Judge President of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

Prior to that, Pillay, who is of Indian Tamil origin, became in 1967 the first non-white woman to open her own law practices in South Africa's KwaZulu-Natal province, where she represented people protesting apartheid.