More than fifty national Jewish organizations in the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations have endorsed a declaration opposing the rampant discrimination against Israel in the UN and its agencies.
In a statement issued today, Conference of Presidents Chairman Stephen M. Greenberg and Executive Vice Chairman and CEO Malcolm Hoenlein said:
“For years we have witnessed and protested the escalating discriminatory practices and actions against Israel at the UN. As we have seen in recent months, this bias is being manifested in outrageous and flagrant ways. These actions not only distort the truth about Israel, they also undermine the principles of the UN and its Charter. It has to stop.
More than 50 national member organizations of the Conference of Presidents have joined in endorsing and supporting the Declaration Opposing Discrimination Against Israel at the United Nations (the “Declaration”),a national and international campaign to counteract the spate of anti-Israel actions at the United Nations.
The breadth of support from Conference members underscores the overwhelming concern within the American Jewish community over the unfounded charges leveled against Israel at the UN. Despite the efforts led by the United States together with Israel and a handful of other countries, vitriolic anti-Israel rhetoric continues to intensify in U.N. resolutions, reports, and in the official statements from many member states.
In 2011 Palestinian President Abbas announced that ‘Palestine’s admission to the United Nations would pave the way for the internationalization of the conflict as a legal matter, not only a political one. It would also pave the way for us to pursue claims against Israel at the United Nations, [and] human rights treaty bodies . . .’
Since November 2012 the Palestinian strategy of using the UN as a weapon against Israel has led to a disturbing increase in the number of anti-Israel resolutions presented in UN bodies. Resolutions adopted in the General Assembly, the Human Rights Council, UNESCO, WHO, and various other UN sponsored committees and events reveal an alarming intensification of baseless accusations and demonizing rhetoric against Israel.”
The Declaration was delivered to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, the President of the General Assembly, H.E. Mr. Mogens Lykketoft, US Secretary of State John Kerry, Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations, Ambassador Danny Danon, and Permanent Representative of the United States to the United Nations, Ambassador Samantha Power. Copies are also being distributed to all ambassadors of member states of the UN.
The Declaration catalogs the institutionalized discrimination against Israel that has permeated the UN in direct violation of the UN Charter and calls on “on all UN Member states to recommit to the founding principles of ‘sovereign equality’ and to ‘fulfill in good faith the obligations assumed by them in accordance with . . .’ the United Nations Charter.”
It calls on Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to use his remaining time in office to join with the signatories to the Declaration and all those who are truly committed to fighting discrimination and prejudice, to end the harm being done to the integrity and effectiveness of the United Nations and to right the egregious wrong to which Israel is subjected at the UN.
The Conference of Presidents will enlist others of all faiths and nationalities, political leaders and opinion molders, religious and business leaders, all people of good will who want the UN to live up to the principles and values on which it was founded, to add their support and join in signing the Declaration.
See the following list of signatory organizations:
Alpha Epsilon Pi
Ameniu
American Friends of Likud
American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors & Their Descendants.
American-Israel Friendship League
AIPAC
American Jewish Committee
American Jewish Congress
American Sephardi Federation
American Zionist Movement
AMIT
Anti-Defamation Leage
Association of Reform Zionists of America
B’nai B’rith
Bnai Zion
Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America
Central Conference Of American Rabbis
Emunah of America
Greater Miami Jewish Federation
Hadassah
HIAS
Hillel International
Jewish Community Centers Association
Jewish Council for Public Affairs
Jewish Federations of North America
Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs
Jewish Labor Committee
Jewish National Fund
Jewish United Fund/ Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago
Jewish Women Intl
Mercaz USA, Zionist Organization of the Conservative Movement
NA’AMAT USA
National Coalition Supporting Eurasian Jewry
National Council of Jewish Women
National Council of Young Israel
ORT America Inc.
Rabbinical Assembly
Rabbinical Council of America
Religious Zionist Organization
UJA-Federation of New York
Union for Reform Judaism
Union of Orthodox Congregations of America
United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism
Women’s International Zionist Organization
Women’s League for Conservative Judaism
Women of Reform Judaism
Workmen’s Circle
World ORT USA
World Zionist Executive, USA
Zionist Organization Of America
The World Union For Progressive Judaism
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