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B’nai B’rith International President Gary P. Saltzman and CEO Daniel S. Mariaschin have issued the following statement:
 
The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) is scheduled to hold a special session on Friday to single out Israel for defending itself from rioters at, and terrorists pledging to breach, the Gaza border over the course of weeks.
 
We condemn this convening — in the latest example of singular UNHRC attention to Israel — of a Council special session to scrutinize the Middle East’s beleaguered sole democracy. Israel has been the focus of more such sessions than any other country in the world.
 
The outcome of this session has been established in advance: It will recklessly and unjustly excoriate Israel, not its attackers, thus handing the fanatic terrorists of Hamas the propaganda victory they had sought by pushing Palestinians, both combatants and noncombatants, to threaten, provoke and assault Israel and by forcing the very conditions some Gazans have been violently “protesting.” 
 
Israel has a fundamental right and obligation to defend its civilians and its borders, and it has done so with exceptional care and restraint. Hamas, for its part, has repeatedly been caught lying about Palestinian actions and casualties. Yet Hamas itself could not help but acknowledge that the vast majority of the most recent casualties were operatives of the jihadist group.
 
To suggest, then, that the premeditated Gaza riots are attributable to the U.S.’s long-overdue, and rightful, opening of its embassy in Jerusalem is insulting.
 
Israel completely and unconditionally withdrew from the Gaza Strip well over a decade ago — only to be subjected to yet more indiscriminate terror from Gaza. The takeaway is self-evident: Merciless Palestinian extremists seek not any limited territory but to eradicate Israel, as they often openly proclaim.