zondag 27 januari 2008

UN Watch bekritiseert VN Mensenrechtenraad op noodzitting

UN Briefing: Belarus, Egypt Must Release Prisoners Before UN Rights Council Elections
Afgelopen week stemde de VN Mensenrechtenraad met 30 tegen 1 (en 15 onthoudingen) voor een harde veroordeling van Israël. De resolutie veroordeelde Israël voor:
 
"grave violations of the human and humanitarian rights of Palestinian civilians," for "undermining" the peace process, "incessant and repeated Israeli military attacks," and causing "loss of life and injuries among Palestinian civilians, including women and children." 
 
 
De constante regen aan raketten op Israëlische steden en dorpen rond de Gazastrook werden niet genoemd. 
Alleen Canada stemde tegen, en de 15 EU leden en anderen onthielden zich van stemming. Ik begrijp niet waarom wij niet tegen een dergelijke extreem eenzijdige resolutie kunnen stemmen. Olie? De macht van de Arabische lobby? Lafheid?
 
Hillel Neuer, directeur van UN Watch, sprak de raad voor de stemming toe, maar het volgende maakte kennelijk weinig indruk:   
 
Let us also consider who initiated this session: Syria, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan - each of whom just received the lowest possible rating, Not Free, in the annual world survey by Freedom House. Another is Cuba, which just held an election where the ballots had only one candidate. Are these to be the world's arbiters of human rights?
The truth is that this session was fixed from the start. Those who sponsored it could introduce a resolution declaring the earth to be flat, and it would be assured of the same automatic majority.
The real question we face is something deeper. Can civilization survive - the values of democracy, freedom and basic humanity - when its basic ideas are, in such high forums, everywhere under assault?
 
 
Hoelang blijven we de waarheid nog ontkennen? Hoe lang steken we onze kop nog in het zand? Wanneer verzamelen we de moed om aan deze dieptrieste en beschamende vertoning een einde te maken?
 
 
Ratna
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UN Watch to Emergency Session: Blame Hamas Rockets
News and Analysis from UN Watch in Geneva

January 24, 2008

Cuba lashes out, threatens to silence UN Watch after speech exposing Hamas inversion

UN Human Rights Council votes 30-1 to condemn Israel for "grave violations"

An emergency session today of the UN's 47-nation Human Rights Council condemned Israel for "grave violations of the human and humanitarian rights of Palestinian civilians," for "undermining" the peace process, "incessant and repeated Israeli military attacks," and causing "loss of life and injuries among Palestinian civilians, including women and children." The resolution, which made no mention of Hamas rocket attacks or their Israeli victims, was adopted by 30 votes to 1 (Canada), with 15 abstentions from European Union and other countries. UN Watch thanks the many hundreds who urged world leaders not to support the biased and counter-productive text. Click for video of UN Watch's testimony — and Cuba's bullying reply. The full texts of both are below.


Click for Video

 The Case Against Moral Inversion

UN Watch Testimony to UN Human Rights Council
Sixth Special Session, January 24, 2008


Delivered by Hillel Neuer, Executive Director of UN Watch

Mr. President,

The nations assembled in this special session on the Gaza Strip, convened by the Arab and Islamic states, face an immediate question. On the proposal to condemn Israel, for the alleged crime of targeting civilians, should they vote for, or against?

Let us consider the proposed resolution. To understand its purpose we are guided best not by the science that studies the conduct of governments, but that which studies the mind.

In psychology, attributing one's own malicious impulses to others is known as projection. Mr. President, the resolution before us constitutes a classic case of such projection.

It is, after all, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the other Palestinian terrorist organizations, who deliberately fire rockets — over 200 in the past week alone — at innocent civilians in Sderot and other Israeli towns. It is they who attack from populated areas, using their fellow Palestinians as human shields. It is they who reject the very notion of a distinction between combatants and civilians.

Israel, like the rest of the civilized world, does the opposite. In exercising its right and obligation under international law to defend its citizens from such attacks, Israel risks the lives of its own soldiers to avoid harming civilians. To Israel, causing a civilian casualty is an unintended tragedy; to Hamas, it is a cause for celebration. The world knows this.

The supporters of those who fire rockets at nursery schools summoned us here to accuse Israel of violating international humanitarian law, when in reality it is they who deny — in word and deed — the very premise of that code.

Let us also consider who initiated this session: Syria, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan — each of whom just received the lowest possible rating, Not Free, in the annual world survey by Freedom House. Another is Cuba, which just held an election where the ballots had only one candidate. Are these to be the world's arbiters of human rights?

The truth is that this session was fixed from the start. Those who sponsored it could introduce a resolution declaring the earth to be flat, and it would be assured of the same automatic majority.

The real question we face is something deeper. Can civilization survive—the values of democracy, freedom and basic humanity — when its basic ideas are, in such high forums, everywhere under assault?

That will not be decided here today, but every international declaration has its influence.

Those countries who genuinely care about the future — of the Middle East, of a credible UN, of civilization — will vote No.

Thank you, Mr. President.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Cuban Ambassador Rodolfo Reyes Rodríguez
(Exercising right of reply to UN Watch testimony)

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

You know, usually, Cuba doesn't exercise its rights of reply for non-governmental organizations. We appreciate their interventions in the Council as we did before in the Commission, even when they have views different from ours. If I am responding now, I am exercising this right to answer something which is the antithesis of a non-governmental organization.

I am referring to UN Watch and the executive director, Mr. Neuer. I must say, he produced a Hollywood-type display, speaking to this Council and ambassadors and delegates. UN Watch is a lucrative
organization amply funded by the CIA and Mossad, which is devoted to denigrating certain member states and this Council.

He told us that Israel and his own organization are within the so-called "civilized world."  This implied that this special session is in the world of the barbarians.  But I don't know anything greater than the acts of barbarians than are taking place in Gaza — dark hospitals, people without water, and other things that UN Watch and his executive director haven't talked about.

I won't take any more time talking about this false organization, whose voice I have never heard criticizing the concentration camps in Guantanamo. I will simply wait for them calmly in New York, where in the NGOs meeting they will have to render accounts. And we will see what to do with their consultative status...

Thank you.

* * * * * * * * * * *

More from the emergency session:

  • "Israel persecutes Palestinian Semites"
    Palestinian Ambassador Mohammad Abu-Koash told the council plenary that "Israel writes another chapter of terror, massacres, ethnic cleansing, which constitute the pillars of its own creation… Any attempt to curb the Israeli actions is dubbed anti-Semitism. They have a free license to persecute the Palestinian Semites." Click for more key quotes

  • How Countries Voted:  Click here for the full roll-call of today's Council vote.

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