New York, NY . . . Leaders of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations today called on United Nations Secretary General Guterres to publicly reject a U.N Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) report unjustly accusing Israel of being “an apartheid regime that dominates the Palestinian people as a whole.” The report was co-authored for ESCWA by discredited former UN Human Rights Council Special Rapporteur, Richard Falk, who during his tenure repeatedly attacked Israel with expressions of hatred and disdain. Rima Khalaf, Executive Secretary of ESCWA, who praised the report, also has a history of abusing her position by making wholly unsubstantiated offensive comments about Israel. ESCWA is comprised of eighteen Arab countries in Western Asia, including Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Mauritania, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, The Sudan, The Syrian Arab Republic, Tunisia, The United Arab Emirates and Yemen.
Stephen M. Greenberg, Chairman and Malcolm Hoenlein, Executive Vice Chairman/CEO of the Conference of Presidents said, “This latest outrage perpetrated against Israel by a UN body must not be allowed to stand. Richard Falk and Rima Khalaf are serial purveyors of anti-Israel calumnies who abuse their official UN positions to launch unjustified and outrageous attacks on Israel. Secretary General Guterres should unambiguously reject the ESCWA report and undertake to prevent similar unwarranted attacks in the future.
We applaud U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley’s clear condemnation of the ESCWA report and her strong reaffirmation of the U.S. commitment to oppose anti-Israel bias “across the UN system and around the world.”
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