UN Human Rights Council Discusses Israel, Hilarity Ensues

I probably would have missed this, but saw it thanks to the United Methodist General Board of Church and Society and its obsession with all things anti-Israel. According to the GBCS newsletter, the anti-Semite who serves as the UN Human Rights Council (as Orwellian a name as humanity has ever conceived) special rapporteur on the Palestinian territories, Richard Falk, is at it again:

Richard Falk, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, told the U.N. Human Rights Council (HRC) that Israel continued to refuse to cooperate with the mandate.

In making his report last month, Falk expressed concern about Israel’s frequent use of administrative detention, and the expansion of settlements and related violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

Falk warned that the stature and legitimacy of the Human Rights Council itself are at stake. He said it is important to distinguish the pattern of non-cooperation from one of non-compliance with human rights standards and the related defiance of international law obligations.

Right. Because Israel’s acknowledging that there are such things as human rights, sometimes failing to protect them, and then refusing to cooperate with those who want it drawn and quartered, is far worse than for, say, North Korea, to deny that there is such a thing as human rights and treat its people like cattle.

For the Human Rights Council to retain its own credibility, Falk advised that it had to move beyond rhetoric and find ways to take seriously the suffering of the Palestinian people and adopt measures commensurate with that suffering.

ROTFLMAO! Please, stop, you’re killing me! The UN Human Rights Council? Credibility? The organization that counts among its current members China, Congo, Cuba, Russia, and Saudi Arabia? The one that is getting ready to seat Sudan? The one 80% of whose resolutions have condemned Israel (along with one on North Korea and four on Myanmar)? The Human Rights Council only a Princeton academic could refer to in the same sentence as the word “credibility?

Sorry about that—I was beginning to think I had been magically transported to another plane of existence. Do go on:

The main recommendations of Falk’s report are:

•that a resolution should be adopted by the Human Rights Council and a special body be mandated to prepare a study on Israel’s use of administrative detention;
•that the Human Rights Council should commission a study on the adequacy of international humanitarian law to cover situations of prolonged occupation and provide Israel and the international community with appropriate recommendations;
•that the International Court of Justice should be requested to provide an Advisory Opinion on the Israeli practice of transferring detained Palestinians to prisons in Israel; and
•that the Human Rights Council should give increased attention to Israel’s refusal to cooperate with the normal functioning of the United Nations by way of the Special Rapporteur for the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967.

The great thing about the UN is that, no matter how outrageous its positions and prejudices might be, it doesn’t actually accomplish anything. Falk’s solution for maintaining the Council’s “credibility” is 1) a resolution; 2) a study; and 3) an opinion. Oh, and it should do more of what it has been doing since it was formed in 2006 to replace the disgraced Human Right Commission, which is focus even more attention on Israel’s refusal to cooperate with those who wish to see it destroyed.

There were responses to this new and shocking information from the UN’s hired gun:

Speakers reiterated alarm at the building of Israeli settlements on Palestinian territory, the continued practice of administrative detention, including against women and children, limitations to the freedom of expression and movement, and settler violence against Palestinians and their property.

Speakers during the dialogue were Jordan on behalf of the Arab Group, Cuba, Libya, European Union, Tunisia, Bahrain, Venezuela, Pakistan on behalf of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, United Arab Emirates, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Sudan, Iran, Syria, Malaysia, Indonesia, Latvia, Bangladesh and Kuwait. [Emphasis added.]

Why the GBCS chose to highlight this parade of hypocrisy by the UNHRC is anybody’s guess. Me, I’m pretty sure that they agree with the Cubas and Sudans of the world, about whose human rights violations GBCS rarely if ever says anything, either.