Israel’s government sharply criticized U.N. chief António Guterres on Monday, with a Prime Minister’s Office spokesman telling the press, “I don’t think any U.N. secretary-general in history has gone so far to secure the survival of a terrorist organization.”
Prime Minister’s Office spokesman Eylon Levy spoke in reference to Guterres’s Dec. 6 invocation of Article 99 of the U.N. Charter, which allows the secretary-general to bring to the Security Council’s attention issues he perceives as a threat to international security.
Guterres called for a “humanitarian ceasefire” in a letter to the council, saying conditions in Gaza were “fast deteriorating into a catastrophe with potentially irreversible implications for Palestinians as a whole.”
“The international community has a responsibility to use all its influence to prevent further escalation and end this crisis,” he said.
A ceasefire, Israel argues, would disrupt its war aim of eradicating Hamas from the Gaza Strip, leaving the terrorist group wounded but likely to recover and resume control of the enclave.
Thirteen of the 15 Security Council members voted in favor of the resolution. The U.S. vetoed it while Britain abstained.
“This war will end when it is safe for the children of [the communities of] Be’eri and Nir Oz to sleep in their beds again,” Levy said. “This war will end when the diplomats who voted to save Hamas’s skin at the United Nations would feel safe babysitting little [4-year-old rescued hostage] Abigail Edan in Kfar Aza. Let’s call it the ‘diplomat babysitter test’ for ending this war.”
On Dec. 8, Israel thanked the U.S. for vetoing the proposed U.N. resolution, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saying, “I greatly appreciate the correct stance that the U.S. has taken in the U.N. Security Council.”
Israeli Ambassador to the U.N. Gilad Erdan also expressed appreciation to the U.S. for “standing firmly by our side and showing its leadership and values.
“It is shocking that while Hamas is firing rockets at Israel from population centers in southern Gaza, the U.N. is busy debating a distorted resolution that will enable Hamas terrorists to stay in power and does not condemn them,” Erdan added. “A ceasefire will be possible only with the return of all the hostages and the destruction of Hamas.”
Hamas still holds 137 hostages in Gaza, including four from before the Oct. 7 massacre. The total number includes 117 males and 20 females of whom 126 are Israeli citizens and 11 foreign nationals. Ten of the hostages are over the age of 75 and two are children, who Hamas claims have died in captivity.
Twenty hostages taken on Oct. 7 have since been murdered by Hamas. Hamas continues to hold on to their bodies. JNS
“Israel is the Middle East’s only democracy and
shows much greater respect for human rights
and due process than its neighbors,
yet Israel is singled out time and time again
by the United Nations for criticism,
including by those who are themselves
serious human rights abusers.”
SOURCE: The UN’s Legacy of Bias and Failure
by Aaron Feigenbaum, 2014 August 23 aish (dot) com
===================================
Does the United Nations (U.N.) discriminate against Israel?
“Israel is the ONLY U.N. [United Nations] state not
permitted to be a full member of any of the U.N.’s five regional groups.
Throughout the Human Rights Council sessions,
these groups hold key planning meetings in
which countries negotiate and share
important information behind closed doors.
Even the Palestinian Authority, though not a state,
is permitted into the Asian regional group.”
SOURCE: article by Anne Bayefsky 2010/9/24 in The Jewish Voice.
===================================
Ruthie Blum [journalist and author] said:
“…Israel’s very existence is under global assault
by the BDS movement and the United Nations.”
SOURCE:
Shameful comparisons in the name of politics
by Ruthie Blum, 2019 August 6 www (dot) JNS (dot) org
UN Leader Ban Ki-moon, in Departing Speech,
Admits Anti-Israel Bias at World Body
posted on 2016 December 16 by JNS dot org
(JNS dot org) United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who is stepping down at the end of the year, acknowledged in a departing speech that there is “disproportionate” bias against Israel at the world body.
“We must never accept bias against Israel within U.N. bodies,” Ban said Friday.
Ban went on to admit that the U.N. has a “disproportionate volume of resolutions, reports and conferences criticizing Israel,” and that “in many cases, rather than helping the Palestinian cause, this reality has hampered the ability of the U.N. to fulfill its role effectively.”
Israeli Ambassador to the U.N. Danny Danon commended Ban’s statement and noted the disproportionate number of anti-Israel resolutions passed at the U.N. in recent years.
“The secretary-general admitted the clear truth—the U.N.’s hypocrisy towards Israel has broken records over the past decade. During this time the U.N. passed 223 resolutions condemning Israel while only eight resolutions condemning the Syrian regime as it has massacred its citizens over the past six years.
This is absurd,” said Danon.
At the same time, Ban urged Israeli lawmakers to reconsider the controversial outpost bill, which would legalize Israeli settlements on private Palestinian land.
“I strongly urge legislators to reconsider advancing this bill, which will have negative legal consequences for Israel and substantially diminish the chances for Arab-Israeli peace,” Ban said.