In the aftermath of the worst slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust, the United Nations decided that the killers are “peace-loving.”
On May 10, 2024, the United Nations voted and approved A/ES-10/L.30/Rev.1 which said “that membership in the United Nations is open to all peace-loving States,” and that Palestine fully qualifies. It endorsed Palestine as “peace-loving” despite Hamas committing a brutal slaughter of 1,200 people in Israel on October 7, as codified in its genocidal antisemitic charter which is embraced by Palestinians who elected the terrorist group to 58% of parliament in 2006.
The recorded vote was 143 in favour to 9 against (Argentina, Czech Republic, Hungary, Israel, Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea, United States), with 25 abstentions.
On September 10, 2024, Palestine took its seat at the General Assembly of the UN’s opening session. Delegates from around the world embraced the Palestinian ambassador Riyad Mansour.
Delegates of member states line up to greet Riyad Mansour, top right, the Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations, as he arrives for the 79th session of the United Nations General Assembly, September 10, 2024 at the United Nations. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
The beheading of people is “peace-loving” if the victims are Jews. The burning of families alive is “peace-loving” if the family are Jews. The sexual abuse of women is “peace-loving” if the women are Jews. The abduction of babies as hostages is “peace-loving” if the infants are Jews.
So says the United Nations, an institution awash in moral rot which should be defunded and closed.
The UN human rights chief, Volker Turk, spoke in Geneva on September 8, 2024 and let it be known that the events of the past year in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank showed that Palestinians need to control their borders to satisfy their “causes.”
“We know that wars spill over, and into, future generations, fostering repeated cycles of hatred if their causes remain unaddressed.
Sadly, the war in Gaza is the quintessential example.
Since the horrific 7 October attacks claimed the lives of over 1,200 victims in Israel and injured many others, over 40,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces, several thousand injured, and thousands remain under the rubble in Gaza. Each day, Palestinians struggle to survive. Nearly 1.9 million people have been forcibly displaced across the strip, many multiple times. Eleven months on, 101 Israeli hostages are still held to be in Gaza. While the actual number is likely higher, almost 10,000 Palestinians are held in Israeli prisons or ad hoc military facilities, many arbitrarily, with over 50 people having died due to inhumane conditions and ill-treatment. In the West Bank, deadly and destructive operations, some at a scale not witnessed in the last two decades, are worsening a calamitous situation there, already aggravated by serious settler violence.
Ending that war and averting a full-blown regional conflict is an absolute and urgent priority. Equally, the wider situation of illegality across the occupied Palestinian territory deriving from Israel’s policies and practices, as so clearly spelled out by the International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion in July, must be comprehensively addressed.
States must not – cannot – accept blatant disregard for international law, including binding decisions of the Security Council and orders of the International Court of Justice, neither in this nor any other situation.“
The head of the UN Human Rights did not ascribe the murder of 1,200 people in Israel and holding of over 100 hostages to Palestinians. He did not state that Palestinians launched the war nor that they executed bound hostages. He used passive language to describe Israeli victims. Yet he did blame Israeli forces and “settler violence” for the deaths of Palestinians.
Turk ascribed the situation of the “repeated cycles of hatred” from the “illegality” of Israel’s policies regarding “Palestinian territory.”
The UN’s agenda is to fully arm an antisemitic Palestinian state next to the only Jewish State.
Gazans have had self-determination and independence since 2005 when Israel uprooted every civilian and military personnel from the area. The Palestinians had elections which brought the terrorist group Hamas to 58% of the parliament in 2006. Gazans used this freedom to build a vast tunnel infrastructure and war machine rather than build an economy, as they do not simply seek self-determination but a destruction of the Jewish State.
Gazans were able to commit a massive heinous butchering of men, women and children in Israel with a blockade surrounding the terrorist enclave. The United Nations turns a blind eye to the savagery as they perceive the Arab assailants as victims.
The UN wants the Israeli blockade of Gaza lifted so Hamas can have a free flow of advanced weaponry from the Islamic Republic of Iran and other terrorist groups. With such armorment, the root “cause” of Palestinian Arabs – the destruction of the Jewish State – may be realized.
If there is one subject and one region of the planet that everyone likes to opine on, it is the State of Israel. Even countries thousands of miles away with no Jews take the microphone at the United Nations and tell their version of history: how Israel is a vicious force intent on taking over the Middle East.
On September 4, 2024, Guyana’s (population of roughly 800,000 in South America) representative to the United Nations spoke to the UN Security Council about the Palestinian-Israeli war. At (1:24:45), she made the following observation:
“Mr. President, it is worth reminding that the situation in Palestine today did not begin on 7 October, 2023. We must cast our minds back to 1948, because it was in that year that Israel first violently rejected the two-state solution. Since then, the violent rejection has continued, manifest in cycles of war and ever expanding settlement activities inter alia. What we have seen since the 7th of October, are the symptoms of this rejection of the two-state solution.”
The most powerful committee at the United Nations listened to a small South American country fictionalize history and invert reality: that it was the Zionists who rejected the two-state solution, not the Arab world; that it was the nascent state of Israel that launched the 1948 war, not five Arab armies; that it is the Jewish State that rejects two states leading to the October 7 massacre, not the antisemitic jihadi terrorist group Hamas which has sworn to destroy every inch of the Jewish State.
Representative of Guyana addressing the UN Security Council on September 4, 2024
The United Nations is systemically anti-Israel and antisemitic, and member states freely falsify history to defend their attacks against the Jewish State. In a world of “my truths,” instead of facts, how can a small minority group withstand the onslaught of unmoored lies?
ACTION ITEM
Write the office of the Prime Minister of Guyana at opm@opm.gov.gy and of foreign affairs at minfor@guyana.net.gy and tell them that the country’s representative at the United Nations lied repeatedly before the Security Council and inverted facts that it is the Arab world which has rejected the Jewish State, not as she presented history.
The antisemitic and anti-Israel dynamics have become so intolerable over the past months, that many people are rethinking their voting priorities to put Jewish issues before every other matter. Alan Dershowitz speaks for many when he says that he is forgoing every non-Jewish charity now and only giving to Jewish causes.
But there is a need to rethink the Jewish charities also. Some have become toxic to Israel and the Jewish people.
Let’s start with B’Tselem, the organization that claims to work on behalf of human rights.
On September 4, 2024, B’Tselem Executive Director Yuli Novak’s addressed the United Nations Security Council, the most senior committee in the global body that has the power to pass international laws. In her prepared remarks, she lambasted Israel repeatedly calling it a vicious state of racism, apartheid, ethnic cleansing and violence.
Some select comments include:
“Since Israel was founded, the guiding logic of its regime has been to promote Jewish supremacy“
“the Israeli government does not want to return the hostages in a deal, but to continue the war indefinitely.”
“The current government’s guidelines state that: “The Jewish people have an exclusive and unquestionable right to all parts of the Land of Israel.””
“it [the Israeli government] is waging war on the entire Palestinian people – committing war crimes almost daily.”
“Settlers are attacking Palestinians and carrying out pogroms in broad daylight, with support from the government.”
“Palestinian citizens of Israel [aka Israeli Arabs] are suffering an almost total suppression for their freedom of expression and freedom of protest”
“[Israeli] violence is possible because Israel has enjoyed impunity for decades”
“It is time for the Council to address the opinion of the International Court of Justice on the illegality of Israel’s entire occupation and settlement project.”
“Every day the Council does not act on the court’s call to end the occupation and apartheid, is another day you are abandoning us – the people suffering and dying needlessly under this cruel and unjust regime.”
B’Tselem Executive Director Yuli Novak’s addressed the United Nations Security Council
This was not a protest speech on an Israeli street corner but a damning indictment of Israel by an Israeli directed to the center of power which can impose tremendous damage on the Jewish State with a specific request to harm Israel. The smears of “Jewish Supremacy,” “apartheid,” “pogroms” and “war crimes” will be echoed on college campuses with a finger pointed to this very speech as defense.
B’Tselem is backed by a number of charities, some of which are nominally Jewish. They include the Moriah Fund, The New Israel Fund (NIF) and George Soros’s Open Society.
The Moriah Fund helps fund the anti-Israel Ford Foundation and antisemitic Tides Foundation. According to Influence Watch, “between 1999 and 2018, Moriah Fund has granted $45,718,829 to New Israel Fund,” and supports the BDS (Boycott, Divest and Sanction) campaigns against Israel.
According to Influence Watch, NIF gives money to several anti-Israel groups including Adalah and Human Rights Defenders Fund, whose leaders have called Israel “racist,” “murderous,” and an “apartheid state.”
NGO Monitor lists various charities funded by Open Society which include IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace, rabidly anti-Israel organizations whose members are harassing college students everywhere, as well as other rabidly anti-Zionist groups.
It is not enough to prioritize Jewish and Israeli causes right now: it is important to stop the funding of Jewish groups which are doing their utmost to vilify and destroy the Jewish State and Jewish communities everywhere.
ACTION ITEM
Contact Jewish foundations like UJA and donor advised funds to block donations to B’Tselem, New Israel Fund, IfNotNow and JVP, as well as other toxic antisemitic and anti-Zionist charities.
May 2021 saw a relatively short war between Hamas in Gaza and Israel. As the battle was coming to a close, Yahya Sinwar, head of Hamas’s military, met with Tor Wennesland, the UN Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process.
It did not go well.
Yahya Sinwar, leader of the Hamas terrorist group in Gaza, gestures during a rally in Beit Lahiya on May 30, 2021. (Atia Mohammed/ Flash90)
“It was a bad meeting. It was not positive at all, and we clarified to the [United Nations] delegation that we would hold a meeting of Islamic and national factions in Gaza to decide our next steps,” Sinwar told reporters following the meeting. “It seems that the occupation [Israel] did not get our people’s message,” essentially threatening the Jewish State again.
Hamas demanded that Israel lift tightened restrictions on the Gaza Strip in exchange for continued calm, as well as permit Gaza to rebuild after the 11-day battle between Israel and the terror group. But Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz said that Israel would not permit a full reconstruction of Gaza — with the resulting influx of materials — without the return of two Israeli civilian captives and the bodies of two Israeli soldiers held by Hamas.
Sinwar rejected the proposal and said Israel is “trying to extort us, the Palestinian people, the Palestinian resistance, when it comes to lifting [the restrictions] on our people.”
A spokesperson for the UN Secretary General was interviewed in June 2021 after Wennesland’s meeting with Sinwar, especially on the topic of Hamas’s use of children in armed conflict. The UN offered generic messaging and would not specifically condemn Hamas.
Hamas leader in Gaza Yahya Sinwar sits and smiles in his bombed Gaza office when it was above ground, May 27, 2021 (Courtesy)
Two years later, Sinwar launched a massive war against Israel, killing roughly 1,200 people and taking around 250 hostages. It seemed that Hamas wanted both the UN and Israel to get the “message” that they will be unbowed by any rules of war, and magnify his violence by a hundred times.
Israel learned Sinwar’s 2021 and 2023 messages and is replying to sender: the Jewish State will defend itself aggressively when attacked in such barbaric fashion, and it will always insist on reclaiming its citizens. Any reconstruction of Gaza will depend on Sinwar’s death or capture this time, in addition to the release of the Israeli hostages whether dead or alive.
For its part, the UN continues to pretend that it does not understand anyone’s messages, offering worthless bobbleheads with microphones attached. If it weren’t so horribly tragic, it would be comical.
The United Nations’ role in the Middle East is a dangerous farce. It pretends to be an impartial party attempting to bring peace to the volatile region, when in fact it takes only sides with Palestinian Arabs.
The UN has a person appointed to be the “Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process,” Tor Wennesland. United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres appointed Wennesland to that role in December 2020 and simultaneously to act as Guterres’ “Personal Representative to the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Palestinian Authority.” How could Israel possibly take the position of such a biased representative seriously? Guterres shot the messenger by cementing him with Palestinian cement shoes from the outset.
Not surprisingly, the “peace process” floundered under Guterres and Wennesland, with the Palestinian Arabs together with backers in Lebanon, Syria, Iran and Yemen all coming for the Jewish State in a regional assault.
The biased and tarnished Wennesland continues to address the UN Security Council and the world via social media. Various biases can be found throughout his comments.
On August 16, 2024, Wennesland tweeted that he condemned settler violence and wanted “to ensure full accountability for all involved,” and further called “on the Israeli government to stop settler violence.”
August 16, 2024 tweet calling out Israelis for violence and demanding full accountability
But Wennesland did the opposite regarding Hamas and other terrorist groups attacking Israel, where he did not call out “Hezbollah” and demanded that Israel use “maximum restraint” in responding to terror.
July 27, 2024 tweet not naming Hezbollah terrorists and urging Israel respond with “maximum restraint”
The hypocrisy is a designed feature of the UN. When Wennesland addressed the UN Security Council on May 29, 2024, he acknowledged the “breakdown of law and order” in Gaza as well as the “well-organized looting of the UNRWA Rafah log base,” but deliberately omitted saying that the looting was done by Hamas. In fact, he implied the opposite, that because Hamas was no longer in charge, there was a breakdown of order.
Comments to UNSC on May 29, 2024
Wennesland treats Hamas as a trusted partner and uses the political-terrorist group’s talking points. On August 10, 2024, Wennesland condemned on the “devastating strike on a school sheltering thousands of displaced Palestinian, with dozens of fatalities.” The UN itself admitted that those “dozens of fatalities” were terrorists, yet the UN’s “Coordinator for Peace” parroted jihadi terrorist propaganda.
Official statement condemning the killing of terrorists on August 10, 2024
Wennesland views his role as protecting and promoting Palestinian Arabs, not securing peace. It means advancing their narrative, excusing their terrorism, and preventing Israel from eliminating jihadi terrorists.
Wennesland knows that there are numerous allies of Palestinians all attacking Israel; he names Hizbullah, Iran and the Houthis, even while treading gingerly around Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. It’s because he sees his goal as supporting the creation of a Palestinian state first and foremost, and that means calling for international support for a Palestinian government, even knowing it to be deeply corrupt and antisemitic.
May 29 comments to UNSC
The UN’s idea of a “peace process” is deeply and fundamentally flawed. The UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and Coordinator for Middle East Peace Tor Wennesland should both be fired for abetting terrorism, and all UN agencies in the region should be shuttered.
The United Nations General Assembly was wrapping up its 78th session on August 13, 2024, and was going to pass a resolution about racism with seemingly little objection. At the last minute, South Africa asked for the resolution to include a reference to the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action from 2001. The resolution quickly lost overwhelming support, with only 61 votes in favor, 78 abstentions, and a single opposing vote by Israel.
UN press release on August 13, 2024
The action was deliberate and calculating by South Africa, which recently pursued a case at the International Court of Justice charging Israel with committing genocide in Gaza. The African nation wanted to make Israel appear as a racist entity by opposing a resolution condemning racism.
It was specifically the inclusion of that Durban document that made Israel oppose the resolution. The Programme of Action was a lengthy document discussing racism and xenophobia which veered into the Palestinian-Israel conflict at several points, as jihadi regimes attempted to bundle condemnation of Israel into a document which was designed to confront racism.
Durban conference of 2002 preamble mentioning that “Palestinian people [are] under foreign occupation” and that they have a “right to an independent state.”
The document included a call for Palestinian refugees “to return voluntarily to their homes and properties,” making it an individual right outside of negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. In a 100+ page global document about racism.
The 2001 event, just days before the terrorist attacks on the United States on 9/11, was deliberately inflammatory and made many countries send lower level officials or not vote for the programme.
The United Nations Press team published its usual anti-Israel smear on August 13, 2024, as it described the latest Gaza war. In a headline that read “Humanitarian official describes pitiful regard for International Law, as delegates deplore continued attacks on civilians, suffering of Palestinians,” one would imagine another one-sided piece only critical of Israel. The sub-header about a “financial liquidity crisis” at the UN requiring a shortened article, may explain why the text of the article wasn’t scrubbed of any Israeli narrative.
While the article began that there was a “desperate need to reach a ceasefire” after an Israeli strike on a school in Gaza on August 10, the article – remarkably – included quotes from Israeli sources about who was killed in the attack, rather than only parrot Hamas’ figures which refers to every Palestinian as a civilian and every Israeli as a colonizing terrorist.
The UN article quoted Israeli officials that “its forces targeted a Hamas command centre in a mosque inside the compound and killed at least 31 Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad fighters.” Just a couple of paragraphs later the text would cover an August 3 Israeli strike in Tulkarem where nine Palestinians were killed who were planning “an attack inside Israel.”
While the article did quote Palestinian officials as well, that is routine. What was exceptional in this case was that the Israeli version of events was included in the press release, which is normally absent.
It would appear that the best way to get the United Nations to treat Israel with a modicum of respect and fairness is to starve it of funds.
Israel is the most liberal country in the entire Middle East by leaps and bounds. It has freedoms of religion, assembly and press which are not found amongst its neighbors. It has a diverse population and laws which protect minorities. The country’s western values make it an anomaly in the illiberal region.
Yet despite being a very liberal state, the Israeli people voted for a conservative and religious government to lead them, seemingly at odds with the pluralistic nation’s values. It begs the question as to what drives the disconnection.
Israel Is A Country At War
Israel is not like the United States with only two neighboring countries, each of which recognizes the USA. Israel is surrounded by hostile countries.
Israel is not like Norway which has been at peace for decades. Israel’s neighbors have repeatedly gone to war to destroy the country.
Israel is not like Slovenia, devoid of terrorist groups surrounding it. Israel is surrounded on all sides by terrorist groups and their sponsors.
Israel has been in a constant state of war with its neighbors since its founding, and still has dozens of terrorist groups alongside it sworn to the country’s destruction.
Israel Is Under Assault At The United Nations
Israel is not like Turkey with no standing resolutions at the U.N. about its occupation of Cyprus. There is a standing resolution against only one country: Israel.
Israel is not like Pakistan without a unique U.N. agency dedicated to descendants living in a neighboring land labeled “refugees” who are being pushed to move back. The UN created and maintains UNRWA, a unique refugee agency apart from the global refugee agency, which pushes to have all those descendants move into Israel.
Israel is not like the Vatican which allows full and open prayer for Catholics in the holy city. The U.N. has an official policy of denying Israeli Jews the right to pray at their holiest location on the Temple Mount.
Israel is not like Argentina which has no edicts about Argentinians living in disputed places like the Falkland Islands. Yet Israel has U.N. resolutions to ban Israeli Jews (but not Israeli Muslims) from living in disputed lands.
Israel is not like Cyprus whose capital Nicosia is deemed a united city under its control. Israel’s capital city of Jerusalem is not officially recognized by the global body, and it wishes to divide the city in two as it was during war.
Israel is not like India or the United States which labels products made in territories as made in the country. Yet the U.N. and European Union demand that products made in the Israeli territory of Area C in the West Bank be labeled distinctly, if produced by Jews.
United Nations “refugee” camp with a key on top to tell descendants of Arabs who left Israel while they waited for the Jewish State to be destroyed, that the U.N. is the portal to reclaim old homes inside of Israel.
Israel is perpetually treated as an offensive guest at the United Nations, and not a member state like other countries.
Israel Is On Active Defense
Israel is a liberal democracy at war with illiberal jihadi entities, and consequently elects right-wing governmental officials whom it believes will protect the country and its people, even though the populace strongly desires to elect new leadership.
American media that berates Israel’s right-wing government without simultaneously vilifying the antisemitic Palestinian jihadists, are effectively parroting hateful Hamas propaganda.
American politicians that boycott Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to a joint session of Congress are essentially supporting the Islamic Republic of Iran’s mission to isolate and destroy the Jewish State.
We know how America, France and other liberal democracies address jihadi terrorism which has no existential threat to the survival of the country. We know how those countries’ liberal citizens vote in elections when their basic safety and human rights are compromised.
People demand safety first and foremost from their governments, and will elect leaders who provide such security, especially when under brutal attack. Demonizing those elected leaders for doing what their liberal citizens require for survival is a reward to terrorists. In Israel, such prize goes to the genocidal Palestinian maniacs who wish to ethnically cleanse the holy land of its Jews.
ACTION ITEM
Write Sen. Chuck Schumer and Rep. Jerry Nadler to stop condemning the Israeli government for fighting to protect its citizens from genocidal Palestinian Arabs.
The top court of the United Nations, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s presence in territories it captured in the June 1967 Six Day War is illegal. Specifically, it decided that “Israel’s presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory unlawful.” ICJ’s President Nawaf Salam said that “Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and the regime associated with them, have been established and are being maintained in violation of international law.”
To arrive at such conclusion, the ICJ must believe that Jordan is Palestine.
The “West Bank and East Jerusalem” were captured in a defensive war that Israel fought after Jordan (Transjordan at the time) attacked it from those lands in 1967. TransJordan had annexed those lands in April 1950 after it fought a war to destroy the nascent Jewish State. Only Britain, Pakistan and Iraq recognized that annexation.
It would appear that the ICJ has now recognized that annexation as well.
The San Remo Conference of April 1920 set the outline for carving up the defeated Ottoman Empire into a number of mandates, including the Mandate of Palestine which covered today’s Israel, Gaza, West Bank and Jordan. According to the British Mandate which took effect in July 1922, Britain had the right to separate Mandate Palestine into two areas: one for the Jews west of the Jordan River and one area east of the river, according to Article 25. It did so on May 23, 1925 in the area that became Trans-Jordan. Trans-jordan declared its independence on May 25, 1946.
Britain was having difficulty dealing with the eastern Palestinian Mandate and turned to the United Nations for assistance. In November 1947, the UN General Assembly voted to partition the remaining eastern Palestine into a Jewish State and and Arab State, with the area of Greater Jerusalem and Greater Bethlehem to be held by the United Nations in a Corpus Separatum, an international zone.
UN’s plan for an internationally-controlled “Corpus Separatum” including Greater Bethlehem and Jerusalem
The UNGA and the Jews accepted the planned division but the Arabs rejected it. When Britain left the region in May 1948 and the Jews declared a new State of Israel, the Arab world attacked. At the end of the war, Transjordan seized the area that became known as the “West Bank”, the eastern part of Jerusalem and all of greater Bethlehem. Israel took the western part of Jerusalem. Transjordan ethnically cleansed its annexed lands of all Jews and gave citizenship to everyone who lived in those lands in 1954, except if they were Jews (Article 3).
“Corpus Separatum” in purple as divided between Israel (shaded grey) and Trans-Jordan (in white)
Palestine did not exist as a distinct country pre-1948, but was a subset of Greater Syria as part of the Ottoman Empire until 1917, and then under British rule. Under the British, the land was separated into a portion west of the Jordan River set up to be a reestablished Jewish homeland, and east of Jordan River to be Transjordan. After the Israeli war of independence, there was still no “Palestine” but an expanded Jordan which seized the western shores of the Jordan River which were to be part of the Jewish homeland, and eastern Jerusalem which was designated to be an international city.
Whether during the Ottoman Empire, British Mandate, or during Israeli and Jordanian rule, there was never a country called Palestine. Further, “East Jerusalem” a fragment of the city which existed only during 18 years from 1949-1967 under Jordanian rule, was never contemplated to be part of Palestine in any formulation.
Israel fought a defensive war with Transjordan in 1948-9 and then again in 1967 in land that was specifically designated in the San Remo Conference and the British Mandate to be an integral part of the Jewish homeland. In order to consider the “West Bank and East Jerusalem” to be “occupied” and “illegal”, one would have to declare that:
the British mandate to have been illegal
the annexation of the seized land west of the Jordan River by Transjordan in 1949 to be legal
Jordan’s ethnic cleansing of Jews from those lands and barring them from citizenship to be legal
Jordan to be Palestine
In no other configuration could the ICJ conclude that Israeli Jews living in eastern Jerusalem is illegal and should be expelled.
The ICJ ruling is revisionist history and deeply antisemitic. It shows the moral rot of the United Nations which still has “Zionism is racism” in its lifeblood.