Israel has desperately sought to be legitimized by the UN, while it has done its utmost to delegitimize the UN.
There is a great irony in the fact that Israel is seeking a seat at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC).
Since its establishment atop the ruins of Palestinian cities and villages in 1948, Israel has had the most precarious relationship with the world’s largest international body.
It has desperately sought to be legitimized by the UN, while it has done its utmost to delegitimize the UN.
Following a resolution at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) condemning Israel’s human rights abuses in the Occupied Palestinian Territory in March 2014, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, then accused the UN of being “absurd”. He vowed to “continue to denounce and expose” the UN “procession of hypocrisy.”
For many years, Israeli leaders and government officials have made it a habit of undermining the UN and its various bodies and, with unconditional support from Washington, habitually ignored numerous UN resolutions regarding the illegal occupation of Palestine.
To a certain extent, the Israeli strategy of using and abusing the UN has worked. With US vetoes blocking UN attempts to pressure Israel to end its military occupation and human rights violations, Israel was in no rush to comply with international law.
But two major events have forced an Israeli rethink.
First, in December 2016, the US abstained from a UN resolution that condemned Israel’s illegal settlement activities in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
By breaking with a decades-long tradition of shielding Israel from any international censure, it appeared that even Washington’s seemingly undying allegiance to Tel Aviv was uncertain.
Second, the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement began changing the dynamics of international politics regarding the Israeli occupation.
The movement, which began as a call by Palestinian civil society to hold Israel accountable for its violations of Palestinian human rights, grew rapidly to become a global movement. Hundreds of local BDS groups multiplied around the world, joined by artists, academicians, union members and elected politicians.
Within a few years, BDS has registered as a serious tool of pressure used to denounce the Israeli occupation and demand justice for the Palestinian people.
UNHRC quickly joined in, declaring its intention to release a list, thus exposing the names of companies that must be boycotted for operating in illegal Israeli settlements.
The human rights group’s efforts were coupled by repeated condemnations of Israel’s human rights violations as recorded by the UN cultural agency, UNESCO.
This meant that UN bodies that do not allow for veto-wielding members grew in their ability to challenge the UN Security Council.
The actions of UNHRC and UNESCO spurred a determined Israeli-American campaign to delegitimize them.
Since the Donald Trump Administration’s advent to power, and with the help of his ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, Washington has waged a war against the UN, using intimidation and the threats of withholding funds.
UNESCO insisted on its position, despite the cutting off of funds. Meanwhile, UNHRC decided to go along with publishing the list of companies, despite US threats to pull out of the human rights body altogether.
According to Israel’s Channel 2, the list includes Coca-Cola, TripAdvisor, Airbnb, Priceline and Caterpillar. It also includes national Israeli companies and two large banks.
Israeli officials fumed. Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely charged that “The UN is playing with fire”, threatening that such initiative will cause further loss of UN budget.
She even declared that the US and Israel are working together to start a ‘revolution’ at the Human Rights Council through a joint ‘action plan.’
Signs of this oddly termed ‘revolution’ are already apparent. Aside from choking off UN bodies financially, Israel is lobbying countries in the South that have traditionally exhibited solidarity with Palestinians due to the common historical bonds of foreign oppression and anti-colonial struggles.
Netanyahu had just concluded a trip to Latin America, considered the first by a sitting Israeli Prime Minister. In the last leg of his trip in Mexico, he offered to ‘develop Central America.’
The price is, of course, for Latin American countries to support Israel’s occupation of Palestine and turn a blind eye to its human rights violations in Palestine.
The irony that, fortunately, did not escape everyone is that last January, Netanyahu declared his support of Trump’s promise to wall off the US-Mexico border and force Mexico to pay for it.
It remains to be seen how Israel’s efforts will win Latin America to Israel’s side, considering the latter’s terrible record of supporting fascist regimes and subverting democracy.
The Israeli Prime Minister’s charm offensive was planned to include Togo in October to attend the Israel-Africa Summit. Thanks to the efforts of South Africa, Morocco, among other countries, the summit was cancelled due to the fact that over half of African countries were planning to boycott it.
The setback must have been a major diplomatic embarrassment for Tel Aviv as Netanyahu has made African diplomacy a pillar in his foreign policy. Last June, he visited Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, Tanzania and Rwanda. He was accompanied by a large delegation of business executives. Earlier in June, he promised African leaders at the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) summit in Liberia to supply them with agricultural technology that would stave off droughts and food scarcity.
The price? According to African News Agency (ANA), “Israeli technology would solve Africa’s most urgent issues—as long as African nations opposed UN resolutions critical of Israel’s occupation of Palestine.”
Not all African leaders allowed themselves to be manipulated by Tel Aviv.
But the Israeli tactic is certainly becoming more defined and emboldened. Tel Aviv’s aim is to undercut the support of Palestinians at the UN General Assembly, and sabotage the work of UN bodies that exist outside the realm of US power.
Meanwhile, it also wants to secure a seat for itself at the UN Security Council. The assumption is that, with the support of Haley at the UN, such a possibility is not far-fetched.
In addition to the five-permeant veto-wielding UN Security Council members, ten-member countries are elected on a two-year term basis. Israel’s charm offensive in Latin America, Africa and Asia is meant to ensure the needed vote to grant it a seat in the 2019-2020 term.
The vote will take place next year, and Israel will stand against Germany and Belgium.
Israel’s strategy of elevating its status at the UN can also been seen as an admission of failure of Tel Aviv’s antagonistic behavior. However, if Israel wins that seat, it is likely to use the new position to strengthen its occupation of Palestine, as opposed to adhering to international law.
It is unfortunate that the Arabs and the Palestinian Authority are waking up to this reality quite late. Israel has been plotting for this moment for years—since 2005 under the premiership of Ariel Sharon—yet the PA is only now requesting an Arab League strategy to prevent Israel from reaching that influential position.
What Palestinians are counting on, at the moment, is the existing historical support that the Palestinian people have among many countries around the world, especially in the global South.
Most of these nations have experienced colonization, military occupation and had their own costly and painful liberation struggles. They should not allow a colonialist regime to sit atop of the UN, obstructing international law while preaching to world about democracy and human rights.
To my knowledge, Israel has NOT ratified the NPT and inspections will probably show it has NO nuclear weapons at all. The Vanunu Affair was simply an elaborate Mossad misinformation exercise.
Israel is not a party to the NPT.
Amazing how twisting the facts comes so easily for Ramzy Baroud. The UN has made more ridiculous resolutions against Israel, including those by the Arab run Security Council then I care to mention. It is also ashamed that such an esteemed writer writes an article based completely on conjecture and personal opinion. The Arabs who live in what is today the State of Israel, including the so called ‘west bank’ and the Gaza strip were imported in the last 100 or so years, so a connection to the land was only superficial. Their constant quest to undermine Israel by having writers make up baseless information does not really help their cause but shows how low they will go to get a piece of land.
The BDS was founded by Barghouti a Qatar national, and not a so called “Palestinian”. Although he married an Israeli Arab woman from Akko, his connection to the State of Israel is nothing more than a convenience marriage. It is very unfortunate that Israel allows such individuals to reside within the state and offer them rights similar to actual citizens, while they go about trying to prove how awful is Israel. The truth of the matter is that since the BDS was formed many companies have increased their income by up to 50%. The BDS which is outlawed in more and more countries world round has brought to the attention of the masses which products/technologies are Israeli. By pinpointing these, more and more people are purchasing such goods/technologies.
Israel is not illegally occupying any land under international law. In order for that particular statement to be accurate it the following scenario would have had to take place: Israel violently attacks a sovereign country and takes over their lands within the sovereign country, and resettling by force their own population. Since it was Lebanon, Jordan, Syria, Iraq and Jordan that violently invaded Israel while trying annihilating Israel, this statement is completely in accurate. If journalists would stick to the facts and not spread lies, there would be a better chance of the Arabs calling themselves ‘Palestinians’ obtaining their own state.
Luckily for the US and Israel Nikki Haley is now in the UN and is helping realize what that organization is really about: to help the countries of the world stay in the right direction, give direction, allow for the security council to take care of countries with human rights atrocities such as those in Iran, Iraq, Syria, Egypt Sudan, Nigeria, Pakistan, etc. and not to dwell on if a citizen of Israel built a house on public lands with the permission of the sovereign State of Israel. One day down the line the Arabs will realize that lying and providing inaccurate information, false accusations and spreading of hatred was really not the way to obtain their goals.
The comments section is for serious comments.
Arabs were the majority in Palestine since the beginning of the Zionist movement. By 1948, the Jewish population had grown to about a third mostly due to immigration, whereas the increase in the Arab population was almost entirely natural growth.
This racist idiocy has no place here.
“Israel is not illegally occupying any land under international law.” Really?
Quoting an anonymous post from elsewhere….
“EVERY single government on the planet and EVERY single body of
international law from the UN Security Council (Resolutions 242,
298, 446, 452, 468, 469, 471, 476, 478, 607, 608, 636, 641, 672,
673, 681, 694, 726, 799, 904, 2334 [23 December 2016]) to the
International Court of Justice (2005 Wall Opinion) to the High
Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention to the
International Committee of the Red Cross and even Israel’s own
High Court of Justice (Duweikat et al. [1979] as well as
Mara’abe v The Prime Minister of Israel [2005]) agree that the
Occupied Palestinian Territories are under belligerent foreign
occupation, that the rules set forth in the Fourth Geneva
Convention apply, and that Israel doesn’t have a legal claim to
even a single olive pit there.”
Israel, the angry, unhappy and psychological misfit nation it is, full of hate and contempt for the world and human value, is a country that never gives damn or due considerations to international law and always have contempt for world opinion! Israel looks like a strangely disconnected, self-serving echo-chamber. While the illegal government perceives its hasbara efforts to be helping the nation ride high on a wave of righteousness, the sad reality is that the country is increasingly isolated and adrift, cast away on a wave of its own delusion. Israel the largest threat to world peace…”Either Israel needs to stop calling itself a Jewish state or the global Jewish community needs to disavow the state of Israel unequivocally. Otherwise there is no difference between Jews and zionists, and continuing to blame zionists, shields Jews from criticism for their crucial financial and political support of the JEWISH state of Israel and their complicity in its crimes.”
Agreed. They have taken a path that becomes increasingly more difficult yet they will not bend…therefore, they will break.
–Israel’s charm offensive in Latin America, Africa and Asia is meant to ensure the needed vote to grant it a seat in the 2019-2020 term– That would be an unfortunate tragedy like that we see Occupation of Palestine and Occupation of Kashmir!