December 2, 2016, New York, NY . . . Leaders of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations today denounced the latest installment of one-sided, distorted anti-Israel resolutions adopted by the UN General Assembly, as an attack on Israel, an affront to Jews, Christians and other faith traditions and an assault on the core values of the United Nations Charter.
Stephen M. Greenberg, Chairman and Malcolm Hoenlein, Executive Vice Chairman and CEO of the Conference of Presidents said, “The hypocrisy of so many nations who continue to blindly vote in favor of, cowardly abstain or don’t vote on, resolutions bashing Israel without considering the long term corrosive impact on the integrity and credibility of the United Nations, is shocking.
With each passing year, the content and scope of these resolutions grow more outrageous.
This year’s resolution on Jerusalem had 149 countries voting in favor of a text that lies about Israeli actions in Jerusalem and insults the Jewish people by referring only to the Muslim name for the holiest site in Judaism. As usual, the United States, Israel and Canada led the small band of seven nations voting against the resolution, while a mere eight countries, including four from Latin America and one from Africa, joined with Australia, Papua New Guinea and Vanuatu, abstained. Thirty countries didn’t bother to vote.
Another resolution, incredibly, called on Israel to give Syria control of the Golan Heights. How could 103 countries seriously consider this to be a worthwhile idea in the face of the barbarous mayhem, daily bombings and ongoing acts of terrorism in Syria, while 56 countries abstained, 28 did not cast a vote and only the United States, Canada, Israel, Micronesia, Marshall Islands and Palau voted against it?
And, of course, the General Assembly once again voted to provide a portion of the UN’s budgetary resources to pay the salaries of UN Secretariat employees in the Division of Palestinian Rights and the Department of Public Information whose sole responsibilities are to provide institutional United Nations accelerant to the incendiary anti-Israel actions and rhetoric of the Palestinian Authority.
Even the new President of the General Assembly, Peter Thomson of Fiji, seems oblivious to the absurdity and harm being done to the institution of the United Nations by the annual barrage of one-sided attacks on Israel. He opened the first day of debate on these resolutions wearing a keffiyeh emblazoned with the Palestinian flag, directly contravening the Code of Ethics for the UNGA President, which he developed and swore to uphold which requires the President to “. . . perform his or her duties and responsibilities in an impartial and equitable manner . . .”
In this time of transition to a new Secretary General coinciding with the transition to a new U.S. administration, there is a real opportunity to change the immoral business-as-usual approach of discriminating against, vilifying, demonizing and disparaging Israel in the United Nations and its constituent bodies.
The Conference of Presidents’ DECLARATION AGAINST UN ANTI-ISRAEL BIAS calls on all those truly committed to fighting discrimination and prejudice to demonstrate that commitment in the U.N. and we urge them to join together with the U.S. which has consistently opposed the efforts to delegitimize Israel over the past 68 years.”
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