Low Expectations
It pays not to have any great expectations where solidarity, support and sympathy for Israel are called for.
Michael Kuttner
As past and recent events have amply demonstrated, dead Jews elicit momentary gestures of tribute but admonitions and critical condemnations rapidly replace these fleeting acts. Almost without any pause, the victims are blamed, and the perpetrators are elevated into innocent targets of Israeli vindictive revenge seekers.
Some still live in eternal hope that the light of truth and justice will shine and that the majority of the international community might finally reset its moral compasses.
Unfortunately, given a bleak historical record and current examples of mass hypocrisy, the chances of any manifestations of honest solidarity have reached rock bottom.
A brief survey covering the latest outbreaks of knee-jerk antipathy and mass expressions of double standards should more than adequately reveal the sordid squalor seeping from the depths and now contaminating international discourse.
The United Nations Security Council met last week in a solemn conclave. It had been shamed into convening by the Israeli Ambassador after having ignored the plight of the kidnapped Israeli hostages since 7 October. For eleven months, it has refused to condemn Hamas or even refer to them as a terrorist organization. Unsurprisingly, given the composition of the Council, it was decided at the last moment to also include on the agenda the subject of “innocent” Gaza civilians.
This last-minute addition should have rung warning bells because it was obvious to all but the hopelessly biased that the ground was being prepared for yet another UN Israel bashing exercise. Hope springs eternal in the addled minds of those who live in some sort of parallel universe and who still dream of great expectations from an organization so morally corrupt that it has long outlasted its use-by date.
True to a preordained script that has been successfully acted out on every previous occasion, what followed was not only predictable but surpassed all past performances of mendacious double standards and hypocritical posturing.
Bear in mind that the original reason for the meeting was to discuss the hostages and the terror acts of Hamas and its supporters.
The Director of Operations and Advocacy for the UN’s farcical humanitarian branch set the tone by claiming “torture and sexual violence of thousands of Palestinians taken into detention by Israeli forces.” Note how torture and sexual violence were neatly transferred from the non-mentioned Hamas onto Israel. No proof, of course, was offered for this accusation because, like the blood libels of old, it only takes one sentence for the lies to multiply and spread.
If you think that was bad enough, you haven’t seen anything.
The deputy Russian representative went one better. He asserted that “there were alarming reports of mass graves of dead Palestinians with traces of torture and the removal of internal organs.” Obviously having read the Russian forgery “Protocols of the Elders of Zion” this delegate had no problem in regurgitating the lies and fables contained in that discredited publication.
Unbelievably, not one ambassador seated at the Council objected to this heinous untruth because everyone had been warned beforehand by the Chairman that no interruptions were permitted. Thus, lie after lie was allowed to be articulated and of course subsequently to be spread via the media.
You can be sure that someone claiming to be Jewish, a relative of a Holocaust survivor or an anti-Zionist will always surface when it is time to delegitimize Israel. Their contributions are used to highlight the illegitimate nature of Jewish sovereignty.
Sure enough, on this occasion, a representative of far-left NGO, B’Tselem, had been invited to sponsor the delegitimization of Israel. She excelled at slandering the homeland of the Jews by claiming, among other things, that “since Israel was founded, its guiding logic has been to promote Jewish supremacy over the entire territory under its control.” For good measure, she likened Israelis to Nazis conducting crimes against humanity, “an apartheid regime running a network of torture camps.”
This NGO, incidentally, receives funding and support from many sources, including the New Israel Fund.
Next in line was the UN Security Council representative of Guyana. In a classic case of rewriting historical facts, she maintained that the whole problem of Palestine goes back to 1948 when “Israel first violently rejected the two state solution.” This blatant piece of revisionist falsehood elicited no protest from the assembled diplomats. As anyone who has read the records of the UN debates in 1947 and 1948 would know, it was the Arab delegations which rejected the proposed plan for an Arab and Jewish State. In fact it was the Arabs decision to launch a war of annihilation against any sort of Jewish sovereignty which laid the foundation for the situation we face today.
None of these realties, however, mean anything in the “Alice in Wonderland ” atmosphere that prevails at the United Nations.
The British ambassador parroted the new line, now the Labour Government’s prevailing mantra in London. With nary a hint of embarrassment, she proclaimed, “my Foreign Secretary took the decision to suspend certain UK arms export licenses to Israel this week. This decision in no way undermines our unwavering commitment to Israel’s security.” One can only remain amazed at this astounding display of so-called British solidarity and the hypocrisy which accompanies it.
It was left to the Swiss UN ambassador to demonstrate exactly what passes for duplicitous diplomacy these days.
Remember that this Security Council meeting was originally called to address the execution by Hamas of the six Israeli hostages and the continuing bondage of the remaining ones.
Instead of a unanimous censuring of these terrorist acts and a demand that Hamas be condemned by the UN this is what she had the audacity to spout: “We urge the Israeli authorities to bring to justice all perpetrators of violence against civilians.”
The Israeli representative tried to lay bare the gruesome and horrific situation faced by families of the kidnapped Israelis and to demand that the UN act accordingly.
This, of course, was an exercise in utter futility as those gathered around the table were totally disinterested in either the truth or motivated to do anything to help.
Rubbing salt into the open wound was the fact that the US ambassador left the hall prior to the Israeli delegate’s response. This sent a powerful message to all present and watching of the Biden Administration’s lack of support for any meaningful action.
Not only does this whole farce highlight the dubious advantage of being a UN member nation, but it also throws yet another spotlight on international media. Reporting the negative and condemnatory statements against Israel and ignoring the real intended subject of the gathering once again helps to spread gross disinformation. Even worse was the non-reporting of the whole meeting and its twisted agenda.
Needless to say, social media had a great time spreading slanderous lies, which fell on fertile ground.
Those who harbour no great expectations of truth and justice emanating from the UN and the media were not disappointed.
With another round of UN “narishkeit” (Yiddish for pure foolishness) against Israel due in the coming sessions, one must wonder how much longer we are prepared to put up with this nonsense.
Michael Kuttner is a Jewish New Zealander who for many years was actively involved with various communal organisations connected to Judaism and Israel. He now lives in Israel and is J-Wire’s correspondent in the region.
