I believe you have confused the argument made by Goldstone as well as the point of this blog post. My contention is NOT that every allegation made in the Goldstone report is a verifiable war crime nor, on the contrary, that every assertion in the Israeli report settles the case. Instead, the remarkable point, which I have tried to highlight here, is that the UN fact-finding mission did a remarkable job identifying shady instances that must be impartially investigated (a far cry from the Israeli report).

On this point, the text you cite and others (e.g. Para 53: “The HRCFF Report describes an incident involving an anonymous witness, AD/03, who alleged that he and others were improperly detained and coerced into assisting IDF forces during the Gaza Operation.27 In reviewing these allegations and cross-referencing them with other available sources of information, Israeli investigators were able to establish the identity of AD/03 and determine that his case had already been reported to the IDF prior to the publishing of the report and was already the subject of a criminal investigation by the MPCID”) confirm that these are real people who were involved in tense and possibly illegal wartime operations, and their treatment warrants further investigation.

That is the point of all this.

I haven’t looked through everything yet, but from paragraphs 47-57, dealing with 2 of the “human shield” cases. The report does the exact opposite of confirm the use of human shields.

You said:
“The new Israeli report identifies this anonymous human shield AD/03 and confirms this episode. Other cases of human shield use, e.g. Abbas Ahmad Ibrahim Halawa and Mahmoud Abd Rabbo al-Ajrami, were also confirmed.”

Regarding Abbas Ahmad Ibrahim Halawa and Mahmoud Abd Rabbo al-Ajrami, the report does the exact opposite of confirm the incident:

“50. The consistent evidence was that at no time during the incident were either of the two individuals made to walk ahead of the soldiers or used as human shields. Rather, the two detainees walked surrounded by the soldiers as required by IDF operational procedures, both in order to protect the detainees as well as to reduce the possibility of their escape.
51. The investigation found no evidence to support the complainants’ contention that they were physically abused while in IDF custody. In fact, this contention was contradicted by the records of Mr. al-Ajrami’s medical examination at Shifa hospital soon after the incident. Similarly, the investigation determined that there were no grounds to attribute to IDF forces the vandalism or looting that may have occurred in Mr. al-Ajrami’s home. The investigation noted that Mr. al-Ajrami told investigators that his family had failed to evacuate from the area partly due to their fear of burglaries and looting by other Gaza residents.”

As for AD/03, the report does say they managed to identify him, although they keep him anonymous in the report, and go on to state that he had already opened a complaint with them for investigation (in other words the Goldstone Report in this case, at least, was superfluous). However, then AD/03 derails the investigation into his own incident. The report explains:
“54. At the outset of the criminal investigation, the MPCID contacted AD/03’s lawyer to coordinate an interview with AD/03 at the Erez Crossing … but AD/03 refused the requests. The lawyer asserted that AD/03 refused to be interviewed out of concern for his safety.
55. AD/03 continued to refuse to cooperate even though Israeli investigators explained that such testimony was essential to the criminal investigation. Taking detailed testimony from the complainant, including collection of any materials from the complainant that could be used to further the investigation, is a principal component of an MPCID investigation. The testimony is necessary not only to confirm allegations but also to identify the particular IDF unit and individuals that were allegedly involved…”

In other words, since the complainant wouldn’t speak to the MPCID after repeated attempts to reach out to him, AD/03 refused to cooperate, preventing the Investigation from identifying the unit he was accusing, and stopping the investigation its tracks.

Pending AD/03 providing additional testimony, the case is closed. How is that confirming the episode as described in the Goldstone Report?

Checking this one incident didn’t take much time, but it makes me wonder how many of the other incidents you claim were “confirmed” by Israel, were really just revealed to be groundless or else were similarly incapable of coming to any solid conclusions.