UNITY: All 100 Senators Tell U.N. To Stop Anti-Semitic Bias

When U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley stood in front of the press following her first meeting with the U.N. Security Council last February, she offered a blistering critique of the international body’s treatment of Israel:

The Security Council just finished its regular monthly meeting on Middle East issues. It’s the first meeting like that that I’ve attended, and I have to say it was a bit strange.

The Security Council is supposed to discuss how to maintain international peace and security, but at our meeting on the Middle East, the discussion was not about Hezbollah’s illegal build-up of rockets in Lebanon; it was not about the money and weapons Iran provides to terrorists; it was not about how we defeat ISIS; it was not about how we hold Bashar al-Assad accountable for the slaughter of hundreds and thousands of civilians. No, instead, the meeting focused on criticizing Israel, the one true democracy in the Middle East.

Haley has continued to condemn the U.N. for its treatment of Israel. The Ambassador’s remarks may have inspired the United States Senate to do the same.

According to The Washington Post, all 100 members of the Senate have signed a letter co-written by Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Christopher A. Coons (D-DE) that asks United Nations Secretary General António Guterres to “address what the lawmakers call entrenched bias against Israel at the world body.”

Guterres showed promise when he “yanked and disavowed a U.N. report last month likening Israel’s treatment of Palestinians to apartheid,” reports The Washington Post. However, the United Nations as a whole has much work to do when it comes to Israel.

U.N. Watch, a Geneva-based watchdog organization, has chronicled the U.N.’s frequent condemnations of the middle eastern democracy:

From its creation in June 2006 through June 2016, the UN Human Rights Council over one decade adopted 135 resolutions criticizing countries; 68 out of those 135 resolutions have been against Israel (more than 50%)…

From 2012 through 2015, the United Nations General Assembly has adopted 97 resolutions criticizing countries; 83 out of those 97 have been against Israel (86%)…

Each year, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) adopts around 10 resolutions a year criticizing only Israel. UNESCO does not criticize any other UN member state in a country-specific resolution (100%). An exception occurred in 2013, when, under pressure from UN Watch, UNESCO adopted one resolution on Syria.

The bias and anti-Semitism is frighteningly obvious.

The Senate letter reads in part:

The United States co-founded the United Nations with the intention of saving future generations from war and reaffirming fundamental human rights. While much good is being done and has been done by the body, many of its member states and agencies are using the U.N.’s privileged platform to advance an anti-Israel agenda…

Although, as Republicans and Democrats, we disagree on many issues, we are United in our desire to see the United Nations improve its treatment of Israel and to eliminate anti-Semitism in all its forms…

We praise you for disavowing the recent anti-Israel report by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) and demanding that it be withdrawn. Going forward, we urge you to pursue a comprehensive effort to improve the U.N.’s treatment of Israel along the following lines:

The U.N. funds and maintains a number of standing committees, which far too often serve no purpose other than to attack Israel and inspire the anti-Israel boycott, sanctions, and divestment movement. These committees must be eliminated or reformed…

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) downplays its role in perpetuating troubling anti-Israel bias and activities. UNRWA must pursue reforms or risk significant consequences.

Most troubling is the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC). Charged with shining a light on gross human rights violations, the UNHRC – whose membership currently includes some of the world’s worst human rights violators – instead devotes time to unwarranted attacks against Israel. The UNHRC even maintains a permanent item on its agenda – “Agenda Item VII” – to assess Israel even as numerous other countries, including some represented on the Council, commit egregious human rights abuses against their citizens on a daily basis…

This situation must change. We urge you to engage member states in a comprehensive effort to directly confront and root out this bias.

All 100 US Senators, from Sanders to Ted Cruz, sign letter to UN Sec-General asking him to curb its anti-Israel bias https://t.co/mOkjKrdAVk pic.twitter.com/VkNV6X9St2

— (((Yair Rosenberg))) (@Yair_Rosenberg) April 28, 2017

For too long, the United Nations has kept its aim squarely on Israel for seemingly no other purpose than to demean the only free nation in the Middle East, as well as its people. It is a disgusting practice that must, with the help of outspoken individuals like Ambassador Haley (and a united Senate), come to an end.