THE U.N. AND ANTI-SEMITISM

Undiplomatic Imbalance: The antisemitism at the U.N. is a problem for more than just Israel by Anne Bayefsy

There is a curious omission in the 129-page report on United Nations reform recently produced by a 16-person panel "of eminent and experienced people" at the request of Secretary General Kofi Annan. The U.N.'s own website, under "Main Bodies," lists the General Assembly, the Security Council, and directly below, the "Committee on the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People." But nowhere does the reform report mention this committee.

The omission goes to the heart of what's really ailing the U.N. For the past four decades the United Nations has become the personal propaganda machine of the nom de guerre of Arab and Islamic states — Palestinians. Their aim is to demonize, debilitate, and destroy the state of Israel — the thriving democratic beachhead in their midst — for a start. The original U.N. mission, to protect the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, has been hijacked and corrupted by nations that neither share the universal values of the U.N.'s Declaration of Human Rights nor have democratic intentions.

Is this a paranoid, introverted, hysterical exaggeration? Consider the evidence. .....

To appreciate fully the extent to which the U.N. has been taken over, observe November 29th, the annual U.N. Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, which is the only U.N. day dedicated to a specific people. The occasion was held in the U.N.’s elaborate Trusteeship Council before hundreds of delegates. At the front of the room sat the secretary general, the president of the General Assembly, and the chair of that main U.N. body, the Committee on Palestinian Rights. In a repeat of previous years’ performances, beside them stood a U.N. flag, a Palestinian flag, and in between, a map in Arabic pre-dating the existence of the U.N. member state of Israel. All participants were asked to rise for “a minute of silence...for all those who have given their lives for the cause of the Palestinian people...” — which would include suicide bombers.
Given that the major client of U.N. largess is the Palestinian surrogate for Arab and Islamic warlords, it is a wonder that the experts on U.N. reform didn’t see fit to mention the impact of the bull in their china shop.

On the contrary, they recommended that more bulls be invited in. Reform of the human-rights commission, according to the secretary general’s experts, requires not limiting the commission to states committed to democracy and human-rights protection, but expanding the membership from the current 53 to all 191 U.N. member states. Current members and human-rights enthusiasts like Cuba, China, Saudi Arabia, and Sudan will no doubt be delighted to be joined by friends in Iran and Burma.

In an apparent nod to the ransacking of the U.N.’s peace and security foundation by Islamic states — that have blocked the adoption of a comprehensive convention against terrorism for years — the secretary general’s panel recommended that the U.N. adopt a definition of terrorism. On the bright side, they finally admitted the U.N. doesn’t have such a definition. Until it does, it can hardly be expected to play a serious role in the war against terrorism. But the panel was very careful to recommend that it be a “consensus definition” — U.N. code language for blessing continuing stonewalling by the Organization of the Islamic Conference.