B'nai B'rith International praises the United Kingdom for its decision not to attend the commemoration of the World Conference against Racism at the United Nations this month in New York. The event will commemorate the 10th anniversary of the initial conference which was held in Durban, South Africa. Although meant to combat global racism, the conference was reduced to an anti-Semitic and anti-Israel hate fest.

The conference's initial laudable goal of addressing and combating racism worldwide has been replaced by attempts to isolate Israel by demonizing and delegitimizing the Jewish state.

A review conference, in 2009 in Geneva, featured Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as a speaker, and only furthered the public vilification of Israel. This year's commemoration, by affirming the original Durban Declaration and Programme of Action that had singled out Israel for implied characterization as racist, can unfortunately be expected to yield similar disdain of the ideals it claims to represent.

The United Kingdom joins the ranks of the United States, Israel, Canada, Germany, Australia, Austria, the Czech Republic, Italy and The Netherlands in their decision not to attend the conference. B'nai B'rith is hopeful that other nations will follow their example in standing together against an event that promotes intolerance and bigotry.

The B'nai B'rith Board of Governors passed a resolution earlier this year urging all nations to reject the prejudiced objectives of the World Conference.