B’nai B’rith International has issued the following statement:
B’nai B’rith International delivered a statement on Sept. 17 at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), condemning its obsession with inquiries directed at Israel. None of the world’s worst abusers of human rights are subjected to such treatment.
B’nai B’rith representative to the U.N. in Geneva Klaus Netter addressed the UNHRC concerning its commission of inquiry that is slated to “investigate all violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law” in the Palestinian territories.
But, Netter noted to the council, the resolution establishing this inquiry was “without any mention of such violations at the expense of the citizens of Israel, such as the indiscriminate launching of rockets and mortars into Israeli civilian sites throughout that country. As against the repeated condemnations of Israel, Hamas, the other party of the recent conflict in Gaza, is nowhere mentioned in the resolution.”
Netter also mentioned that 100 members of the U.S. Congress shared in B’nai B’rith’s condemnation of the resolution and quoted a July 25 letter the legislators sent to the High Commissioner for Human Rights: “The U.N. Human Rights Council simply cannot be taken seriously as a human rights organization when it establishes a commission of inquiry to unjustly probe alleged war crimes and violations of international law by the nation defending its citizens from rocket attacks and terror tunnels, rather than the terrorist group whose depravity makes a policy of using its citizens as human shields while its terror commanders flee to fortified bunkers.”
Netter continued: “Apart from its biased terms of reference, the outcome of the inquiry can easily be deduced from the commission’s composition. Its chairman has been quoted as stating at the 2013 Russell Tribunal that Israel has been guilty of ‘crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression’”
Netter concluded: “… let us recall the divisive and wasteful previous council commissions of inquiry directed against Israel, by virtue of which truly grave violations of human rights elsewhere in the world have been ignored.”
B’nai B’rith International delivered a statement on Sept. 17 at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), condemning its obsession with inquiries directed at Israel. None of the world’s worst abusers of human rights are subjected to such treatment.
B’nai B’rith representative to the U.N. in Geneva Klaus Netter addressed the UNHRC concerning its commission of inquiry that is slated to “investigate all violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law” in the Palestinian territories.
But, Netter noted to the council, the resolution establishing this inquiry was “without any mention of such violations at the expense of the citizens of Israel, such as the indiscriminate launching of rockets and mortars into Israeli civilian sites throughout that country. As against the repeated condemnations of Israel, Hamas, the other party of the recent conflict in Gaza, is nowhere mentioned in the resolution.”
Netter also mentioned that 100 members of the U.S. Congress shared in B’nai B’rith’s condemnation of the resolution and quoted a July 25 letter the legislators sent to the High Commissioner for Human Rights: “The U.N. Human Rights Council simply cannot be taken seriously as a human rights organization when it establishes a commission of inquiry to unjustly probe alleged war crimes and violations of international law by the nation defending its citizens from rocket attacks and terror tunnels, rather than the terrorist group whose depravity makes a policy of using its citizens as human shields while its terror commanders flee to fortified bunkers.”
Netter continued: “Apart from its biased terms of reference, the outcome of the inquiry can easily be deduced from the commission’s composition. Its chairman has been quoted as stating at the 2013 Russell Tribunal that Israel has been guilty of ‘crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression’”
Netter concluded: “… let us recall the divisive and wasteful previous council commissions of inquiry directed against Israel, by virtue of which truly grave violations of human rights elsewhere in the world have been ignored.”
