The United Nations Human Rights Council has announced that it has assembled an inquiry commission to investigate allegations of war crimes in Gaza and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, eliciting furor in Israel.

On Aug. 11, the UNHRC published a statement on its website indicating its intention to conduct inquiries into violations committed since June 13, 2014 — the day after it was announced that three Israeli settler teenagers had been “kidnapped.” The statement calls for the routine establishing of facts with regard to violations. The commission is tasked with making “recommendations, in particular on accountability measures” to provide “ways and means to protect civilians against any further assaults.”

Taken within the historical context, as well as Israel’s particular brand of impunity, these recommendations will prove futile against the predictable colonial violence that is expected to recur against Palestinian civilians.

Though the initiative has been welcomed by Palestinians, the statement is flawed on several accounts that are apparent when read through the lens of Israel’s contempt for international law and the settler-colonial state’s own brand of impunity, which has been unequivocally supported by the U.N. Hence, investigations into violations committed by Israel are likely to result in the usual contradiction of affirming the existence of human rights violations, but not going beyond reports, conclusions and recommendations.

This result is already enshrined within the statement published by the UNHRC. Identifying “those responsible” does not automatically mean there will be proceedings to ensure accountability. Instead, the organization will spend time on laborious reports and making “recommendations” to address the reality of continued colonial violence, as the final premise of the quoted statement indicates.

Unsurprisingly, Israel’s reaction — apparent outrage — has grabbed headlines in Zionist media. Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman was quoted in Israel National News as stating: “The State of Israel must not cooperate with this commission. We need to contend with them and not grant legitimacy to enemies of Israel.”

Quoted in another article in the same news outlet, Lieberman embarked on a rant that attempted to slander Cuba and Venezuela, despite the fact that both countries have not initiated aggression culminating in massacres, as in the case of Israel’s perpetual aggression-massacre cycle.

“When countries such as Cuba, Venezuela and the like, who do not know the concept of human rights, point an accusing finger towards us, it is a sign that we are doing the right things,” Lieberman said.

While Israel continues to colonize and plunder Palestinian land, Cuba and Venezuela have empowered the masses through access to education and health care for all of their citizens, lifting the capitalist concept that these parts of life are meant as a privilege, not a right. But at the hands of Israel, Palestinians continue to suffer from the lack of a right as basic as freedom of movement. Both in Gaza and the West Bank, Palestinians face varying measures of control and surveillance which hinder the right to freedom of movement, such as the illegal blockade rendering Gaza an open prison, as well as checkpoints, segregated travel and permit complications in the West Bank.

Marie Harf, deputy spokeswoman for the U.S. State Department, expressed her displeasure at the UNHRC’s investigation. “We’ve always said that if there are specific incidents that need investigation, that we think they should be. We said that with UNRWA schools and we’ve said that in other cases as well,” she said.

Harf added, however, “there’s a way to investigate things that’s not one-sided and biased, and there’s a way we don’t support.”

Citing prejudice and bias, Israel has a turbulent history with the UNHRC. In March 2012, Lieberman decided to sever ties with the council over a vote — which the U.S. vetoed — to investigate the repercussions of settlement expansion upon the Palestinian population. Israel also boycotted the January 2013 session during which the settler-colonial state’s human rights review was discussed.

The impasse mellowed toward the end of May 2013, when Deputy Foreign Minister Ze’ev Elkin stated that “after much deliberation I have recently agreed to diplomatic engagement with the council and major actors in the international community to see if we can arrive at understandings and guarantees that will enable our return to the council, while ensuring that fair play and international standards are applied towards Israel.” The supposedly benevolent gesture was soon followed by Israel’s inclusion in the Western European and Others Group (WEOG) — a move ostensibly designed by imperialist powers to boost Israel’s inclusion in the international community.

Israel’s strategy has been one of unyielding usurpation at every level. The colonization of Palestine has been reflected in the way which Israel, through international accomplices, has managed to evade accountability for decades. While the settler-colonial state legitimizes its perpetrated violence as “self-defense,” an identical approach is taken by the international community in order to ensure that vocal condemnation does not spill beyond the stipulated borders into consolidated measures such as sanctions or indictment. Unless the external, imperialist support for Israel is eroded, there can be no proper investigation into international law violations, precisely because Israel and influential members of the international community have interwoven quests for regional domination.

It is difficult to see how the UNHRC can move beyond the boundaries articulated in its statement. Despite increasing condemnation by the council, Israel has increased its violence against Palestinians over the course of decades. As it currently stands, “Operation Protective Edge” will be remembered as one of the biggest massacres perpetrated by Israel in recent history. Yet, for all its apparent efforts, the UNHRC has already portrayed its limitations in conducting the investigation, as well as hinted at expectations of further atrocities to be perpetrated by Israel in the future.

The statement exhibits a shred of honesty, at least — the council does not expect Israel to cease planning and executing further aggression against Palestinians. Hence, the “recommendations” which, like other U.N. and U.N.-affiliated rhetoric, will undoubtedly carry enough detachment or ambiguity to allow for various interpretations — even despite Israel’s unrelenting lament that it is demonized through international platforms.

Israel has designated the forthcoming findings of the report — due next year — as a premeditated exercise in discrimination and hostility. In keeping with the same discourse, an identical observation can be applied to Israel’s past, present and future track record — a repetition of history that is destined to continue as colonization progresses while the international community persists in betraying the rights of the indigenous population. The additional difference that gives Israel the advantage is the willingness of the U.N. and its affiliated organizations to invent varying levels of accountability and impunity to benefit an entity that instigates the conditions which, in turn, safeguard their existence.