On May 27, 2021, the UNHRC met during its 30th special session to discuss renewed hostilities between the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas and Israel. The UNHRC, an international institution built to uphold human rights, is in actuality a hotbed of bias against Israel. The Council’s selective and unparalleled focus on attacking Israel, but not its violent adversaries, comes at the expense of tackling real human rights concerns throughout the world. This is not by mistake: authoritarian regimes—many of them members of the UNHRC themselves—aim for the Council to be as ineffective as possible in holding them accountable for systemic abuses. Of the 30 UNHRC special sessions until May 2021, fully one-third were dedicated to attacking just one member state, Israel.
​
At the conclusion of the 30th special session, the UNHRC approved a resolution that blamed Israel for the recent hostilities, even though Hamas—which was not even mentioned by name—had initiated and escalated the fighting. The resolution furthermore created a “Commission of Inquiry” to validate the conclusions that the UNHRC (or slightly over half of its members) had already claimed. The COI would look at “root causes” of the conflict and would, unlike any preceding COI, be “ongoing.” This COI is unlimited in both scope and time, allowing endless opportunities for politicization and exploitation.

To staff this COI, the U.N. has created a boondoggle: the Commission’s bloated staff is among the largest for a COI within the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), with generous stipends for travel and other expenses. It will cost taxpayers around the world approximately $5 million annually in perpetuity (the cost will likely rise in the future). To lead the COI, the UNHRC chose commissioners—led by Navi Pillay—with extensive, open anti-Israel records. In any credible judicial institution, being so overtly partial would be disqualifying to “investigating” a complex, contentious question. But at the U.N., this level of bias against Israel qualifies one as an “expert.”
​
B’nai B’rith will not cooperate with a COI that has no interest in fair, impartial treatment of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Like past UNHRC “Commissions of Inquiry” on Israel, the newest COI recycles wild condemnations built upon unfounded accusations against Israel—while paying negligible attention to Hamas and other terrorist groups heaping misery upon both Israeli and Palestinian civilians.