​Another U.N. General Assembly (UNGA) General Debate session is in the books, and—as we have in years past—B’nai B’rith has been actively engaged throughout the week, meeting with presidents, prime ministers, foreign ministers and other diplomats from over 30 countries. The countries we met with this year spanned the Middle East, Europe, Latin America and Asia. B’nai B’rith not only meets with these leaders, but also has the special role of coordinating many of the meetings for a group of major American and international Jewish organizations. We are not the only Jewish organization that meets with world leaders during that week, but we are distinguished by having this role during this time of year at the U.N.
 
Usually one of the Jewish holidays (either Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur or Sukkot) will fall during UNGA week. However, this year the Chagim started late, which meant that for the first time in a few years, we had a full, uninterrupted week of meetings.
 
The broad issues that are on our advocacy agenda for the week—Iran, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, global anti-Semitism, and U.N. bias against Israel—are similar from year to year. However, within each issue area, the topics of discussion can change based on developments on the ground in the Middle East and around the world. The importance of the UNGA week is not due to a specific meeting that we may or may not have in a given year, but because it facilitates an ongoing dialogue with the leadership of an expanding list of countries, so that the specific concerns of the global Jewish community are understood. B’nai B’rith International’s reach, including our offices, units, members and supporters around the world, allows us to play this role.
 
Though marathon speechmaking of the General Debate has ended--as has our own diplomatic marathon--for the General Assembly (G.A.), the work is now just beginning. The G.A. is quickly moving to start its business for the year, as the G.A.’s committees convene and start negotiations on many resolutions that will be brought up to the floor of the G.A. for voting later this fall. B’nai B’rith will be monitoring the key resolutions that are annually voted upon each year at the G.A., including the resolutions that renew the mandate of the Palestinian propaganda bodies housed within the U.N. system (most notoriously, the Committee for the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People and the Division for Palestinian Rights) and the renewal of the mandate of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), among other important resolutions.
 
The start of the Jewish new year and the U.N.’s calendar year often intersect (and, as stated above, sometimes directly conflict). The start of a Jewish new year is a time for optimism and hope for good things to come; the start of a new year at the U.N., sadly, does not inspire the same feelings. At the U.N., we hope for slow progress towards having a world body that lives up to its own goals, and often prepare ourselves for a hard struggle to ensure that the U.N. does not backslide to even more absurd and dangerous positions.

​Last week, the American veto stopped yet another dangerously misguided U.N. Security Council resolution from passing. The resolution was tabled by Kuwait, the current non-permanent member of the council from the Arab states. The U.S. was the only state to vote against it, but the resolution was unbalanced enough that four other states (Ethiopia, the Netherlands, Poland and the U.K.) on the 15-member council also chose not to support it, and abstain. A resolution needs nine votes to pass, as long as none of the permanent member of the Security Council (China, France, Russia, the U.K. and the U.S.) votes against it, so this resolution was close to failure on its own, but it did require a U.S. veto in the end.
 
The resolution was typical of what comes out of the U.N. whenever aggressive provocations by Palestinian terrorist groups lead to a crisis situation. Israel was roundly condemned for defending Israeli citizens and soldiers against Palestinian rioters — often Hamas fighters — trying to storm the border and murder Jews. Hamas was never mentioned by name in the resolution; neither was Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which only days earlier had launched a barrage of rockets toward Israeli communities near Gaza, a situation which could have easily spiraled into yet another war. The resolution does deplore rocket launches from Gaza, but the way it is worded it sounds as if the rockets are magically launching themselves. There is no actor responsible for the terrorism. Some states criticized this lack of naming-and-shaming terrorist groups, but shamefully voted for the resolution nonetheless.
 
The U.S. proposed a resolution that would have condemned Hamas by name at the same council session. Unfortunately, the U.S. stood alone in voting for it. Russia, Kuwait and Bolivia voted against and the rest of the council abstained, many complaining that enough time was not given to negotiate on the text to “balance” it. In U.N. terms, balance is only achieved when Israel is viciously criticized for defending itself and Palestinian terrorist groups are either ignored or are lumped in on calls for restraint by “both sides.”
 
Beyond this phenomenon, which — sadly — appears all too often at U.N. bodies, this resolution was notable for its efforts to create an international protection mechanism for Palestinians. The resolution would not have created the mechanism, but rather started the process: it called on the U.N. Secretary-General to report back on recommendations for such a mechanism. Such a mechanism would be unhelpful in the extreme, and Israel would never allow it, especially given the history of ineffectual international missions being stationed between Israel and its neighbors.
 
In Sinai, U.N. forces withdrew at Egyptian dictator Gamal Abdel Nasser’s demand as Egypt and other Arab countries moved in on Israel in what turned out to be another failed attempt to annihilate Israel. In Syria, the U.N. Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) on the Golan Heights fled early in the Syrian civil war. European Union observers on the Gaza border also fled after the Hamas coup in 2007. Finally, in Lebanon, the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) has not lifted a finger to stop the growing Hezbollah arsenal of thousands of rockets pointing at Israel. Israel knows that in these sensitive areas, only Israel can provide for its own security. An “international mechanism” would only put Israeli (and, ultimately, Palestinian) lives in greater peril.
 
The Palestinians have been issuing calls for international protection for a while at the U.N. So, in essence what we have is the Palestinians asking for a certain policy, which is rightly ignored by the international community as unworkable. Palestinian terrorists then instigate violence and create a situation where the Security Council feels the need to respond, and the Arab states are there to offer a resolution with the solution that the Palestinians wanted all along. Some of the states on the council that voted in favor of the resolution fooled themselves into thinking that it was a balanced text (though, of course, it was not), and that they were voting to urge a stop to a terrible situation. In reality, they were only making the situation worse in the long run by encouraging Palestinian intransigence and, indirectly, violence.
 
Finally, there is a real question of whether or not the riots from Gaza warranted this much Security Council attention in the first place. When there are instances of actual peaceful protests being suppressed by authoritarian states, the council tends to ignore it (see, Iran, Venezuela, and most recently, Nicaragua). Palestinian protesters are only cared about if they appear as a violent riot rushing at Israel’s border; the right to protest against Hamas brutality in Gaza or the Palestinian Authority repression in the West Bank is not important to the international community. At the U.N., hypocrisy is the norm and the U.S. veto is the only check against double standards and delegitimization and demonization of Israel.