ISRAEL'S EUROPEAN ENEMIES AT THE U.N.

UN Man's Apartheid Charge (HonestReporting)
Former US President Jimmy Carter's new book "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid" has recently stirred controversy, both for its title and its contents, which have been criticized and dissected by figures such as Alan Dershowitz. Referring to the book, "Special Raporteur on Palestine to the UN Human Rights Council" John Dugard takes this opportunity to attack Israel in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, claiming that:

Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories has many features of colonization. At the same time it has many of the worst characteristics of apartheid.

HonestReporting has previously debunked the false comparison between Israel and apartheid South Africa.

John Dugard enjoys a "halo effect" created by his role as an "independent expert" working for the UN. This cannot, however, disguise his extreme and one-sided views, which have been given a platform in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

In his one-sided diatribe, Dugard takes aim at Israeli military activities but fails to acknowledge the existence of Palestinian terrorism or any other legitimate reasons for Israeli self-
defense. Indeed, it appears that in Dugard's world, Israeli rights simply do not exist.

This is unsurprising given Dugard's previous statements. Anne Bayefsky of Eye on the UN refers to Dugard as "the UN's Spokesperson for Suicide Bombers" and "the most fanatical spokesperson for terrorism at the UN outside the Arab and Moslem world."

His job description, or UN mandate, deliberately excludes Palestinian human rights abuses. As Dugard lectured the Israeli representative on October 19th: "I have a limited mandate, which is to investigate human rights violations by Israelis, not by Palestinians." The pre-determined outcome, however, has never been a problem for this lawyer. Far from being embarrassed, he launched into this year's diatribe this way: "Today I deliver my annual criticism of Israel's human rights record."

There is no perennial criticism at the UN of the human rights record of any other state, or terror organization for that matter. Just Israel.

Dugard's fanaticism is consistent with the UN reality that the more hysterical his claims, the more likely he is to keep his job. His usual modus operandi is to demonize Israel as the racist, blood-thirsty aggressor opposed by a hapless, freedom-loving people. This year he decided to outdo himself, taking aim at the Jewishness of the Jewish state itself. "The litany of human rights violations...is difficult to reconcile with Israel's...claim to be "a light unto the nations."

Dugard's anti-Israel extremism has also been featured by Frontpage Magazine, which notes his support for sanctions against Israel and his apparent desire to see the end of Israel through the creation of a bi-national state, in contradiction to the two-state solution supported by the UN itself.

Louise Arbour vs. Israel By Jonathan Kay (Political Mavens)
When Israel confronted Hezbollah in Lebanon this summer, it faced an entrenched, fanatical enemy armed with state-of-the-art weaponry provided by Iran and Syria. But just as crucial to Hezbollah’s success in fending off Israel’s attack was another ally: an international human-rights community that draws no moral distinction between the deliberate slaughter of civilians by terrorists and the accidental killing of civilians that is the tragic, but inevitable, consequence of any war.

One of my fellow Canadians, former Supreme Court justice Louise Arbour, is a case in point. As the United Nations’ High Commissioner for Human Rights, her stature makes her a credible future UN secretary general. This may explain why she is busy currying favour with the European, Islamic and Third World constituencies that control the world body’s major voting blocs.

In a Jerusalem Post interview published Friday, Arbour went further than moral equivalence between Hezbollah and Israel. She stated that the Jewish state actually bears more blame in the recent conflict than the terrorists who started the war in the first place. “In [the case of Hezbollah] you could have, for instance, a very objectionable intent — the intent to harm civilians, which is very bad — but effectively not a lot of harm is actually achieved,” she said. “[But] how can you compare that with [Israel,] where you may not have an intent but you have recklessness [in which] civilian casualties are foreseeable? The culpability or the intent may not sound as severe, but the actual harm is catastrophic.”

It is true that more Lebanese civilians died than Israeli civilians. But that was a consequence of Hezbollah tactics, not Israeli cruelty. Indeed, the propaganda issued by the terrorist group during and after the war show that it relished Lebanese civilian deaths as a tool to sway world opinion. In the case of Arbour, this tactic obviously worked.

Moreover, let’s be clear about what Arbour is saying. Hezbollah indiscriminately rained about 4,000 rockets down on Israeli civilian population centres in late July and early August, killing 44 Israelis, injuring more than 1,300, and displacing 300,000 — or about 5% of the Jewish state’s population. Yet by the lights of the one-time Canadian Supreme Court justice, “not a lot of harm [was] actually achieved.” One might ask the former robed luminary: What level of casualties must Israel (or any Western democracy) absorb before they earn the right to fight back vigorously? The rules of engagement she seems to favour are those whereby terrorists barrage Western democracies while we retaliate by — what? — indicting Hezbollah commanders at the International Criminal Court?

In recent days, Arbour has made an effort to at least appear even-handed. During a five-day trip to the region, she travelled to Sderot, a southern Israeli town that’s become a favourite target for Palestinian missile strikes. That trip happened to coincide with a barrage that took the life of 43-year-old forklift operator Yaakov Yaakobov, and she was able to visit the plant where he worked while his blood, and those of wounded co-workers, was still freshly spilled.

Arbour didn’t win any points, however: When she arrived, locals shouted her down, and she was quickly hustled away to a friendlier photo-op. One can forgive Israelis for their rude reception. After being under siege for six decades, they know how to recognize an enemy.