Tuesday, March 21, 2017

Another UN Report

Once again Israel acts with rage because it cannot cope with the
Truth.  It  is very unfortunate that the UN has not only failed for
the last seventy years to bring justice to the Palestinians, it has also
lost its credibility for reacting outrageously against any statements
or reports that expose the truth about Israel.  The recent report of
ESCWA describing Israel’s treatment of Palestinians as apartheid led
to the resignation of Rima Khalaf,  a Jordanian  UN diplomat and
executive secretary of the Economic and Social Commission for Western
Asia, when she was pressured by the UN General Secretary to withdraw
diplomats had this kind of integrity.

Actually I wonder whether the General Secretary even bothered to read
the report.  It looks like he was pressured as usual and unwilling to
stand up for the principles of the UN body lest he face the Israeli
music and the  usual accusations  of  anti-Semitism.  Almost a month
ago the name of Salaam Fayad a former Palestinian Prime minister, came
up for a special UN envoy to Libya, but the Secretary General was
pressured to withdraw the name.  Maybe the UN should consider
changing its name if it is only the US and Israel who actually call the
shots.

Israel considers itself special and wants the whole world to treat it
as special irrespective of what it does.  Moreover, when it  claims to
be the "only democracy in the Middle East" and its army is the most
moral army, it has to be accountable.  No other Arab country in the
region has claimed that it is a democracy.  We have heard courageous
voices saying enough is enough, but they paid heavily for raising
their voice.  Yet, sadly we have watched  how the international
community as well as church leaders  continue to be intimidated and
silenced for attempting to expose the truth.  Until when does the
international community have to deal with this spoiled child every
time he puts up a tantrum?  Even Israeli voices have said it loud and
clear that the occupation is creating an apartheid system.  What do
you call a system that allows its authority to confiscate land,  and
bulldoze complete areas where Palestinians are living so as to
provide housing for Israeli settlements?  And this is but one phenomenon
of the system.  The report was correctly documented with facts
such as:

Israel’s Law of Return, “conferring on Jews worldwide the right to
enter Israel and obtain Israeli citizenship regardless of their
countries of origin and whether or not they can show links to
Israel-Palestine, while withholding any comparable right from
Palestinians, including those with documented ancestral homes in the
country,” as a policy of “demographic engineering” meant to uphold
Israel’s status as the Jewish state.”

The report further accuses Israel of “practices” that have fragmented
Palestinians, “This fragmentation operates to stabilize the Israeli
regime of racial domination over the Palestinians and to weaken the
will and capacity of the Palestinian people to mount a unified and
effective resistance,”

“Israeli law normally allows spouses of Israeli citizens to relocate
to Israel but uniquely prohibits this option in the case of
Palestinians from the occupied territory or beyond.”  Even
Palestinians in East Jerusalem have to go through an endless ordeal to
be able to have their spouses from the West Bank join them in
Jerusalem.  And very often the request is denied.

Actually the following paragraph in the preface of the report should
be a wake up call to the United Nations to realize its responsibility
to put an end to the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian Territories
and to  bring about a just and lasting  solution to the Palestinian
Israeli conflict.

“The situation in Israel-Palestine constitutes an unmet obligation of
the organized international community to resolve a conflict partially
generated by its own actions. That obligation dates formally to 1922,
when the League of Nations established the British Mandate for
Palestine as a territory eminently ready for independence as an
inclusive secular State, yet incorporated into the Mandate the core
pledge of the Balfour Declaration to support the “Jewish people” in
their efforts to establish in Palestine a “Jewish national home”.
Later United Nations Security Council and General Assembly resolutions
attempted to resolve the conflict generated by that arrangement, yet
could not prevent related proposals, such as partition, from being
overtaken by events on the ground. If this attention to the case of
Israel by the United Nations appears exceptional, therefore, it is
only because no comparable linkage exists between United Nations
actions and any other prolonged denial to a people of their right of
self-determination.”

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