Writing a column protesting the hypocrisy of the United Nations is not really fair. It's like a turkey shoot. The evidence is so overwhelming that the U.N. is viciously biased against Israel - and ridiculously biased in favor of the Palestinians - that you're tempted to just move on to a less depressing subject.
But the consequences of these biases are real. Last month, for example, I was reminded at a Jewish World Watch (JWW) event of the genocidal horrors that continue to befall so many millions of Africans, and then, just a few weeks later, I watched the U.N. be all-consumed with yet another resolution against Israel.
According to JWW, the first genocide of the 21st century, in Sudan's Darfur region, has killed up to 400,000 people, and 3 million more have been displaced. If you think that's bad, since 1998, 5.4 million civilians in Congo have been killed by war-related violence, hunger and disease, and 45,000 more continue to die every month. Hundreds of thousands of women and girls have been raped, and 2 million people have been displaced.
Have you seen any emergency sessions and U.N. Security Council resolutions defending these victims and condemning these atrocities? Of course not.
Meanwhile, if you're a Palestinian whose home has been displaced by a Jew in East Jerusalem - with the legal backing of the Israeli Supreme Court, no less - you can expect an outpouring of international support with a ready-made stage for weekly protests and top-level U.N. attention.
My point here is not to overplay or underplay the rights of any group, but to highlight hypocrisy - criminally negligent hypocrisy from an international organization whose charter obligates it to defend the rights and dignity of all human beings.
According to the Anti-Defamation League, from 2009-2010, the U.N. General Assembly passed 22 resolutions that were "one-sided or blatantly anti-Israel," and of their 10 emergency sessions, six were about Israel. No emergency sessions were held on the Rwandan genocide, ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia or the two decades of atrocities in Sudan. That's right, none.
And if you want to rail against the "Palestinian occupation," don't go to Tibet, where, according to various estimates, as many as 1.2 million Tibetans have died due to the Chinese occupation. Now, when's the last time the U.N. took a break from Israel bashing to pass a resolution condemning the "Tibetan occupation"? How about never?
Like I said, a turkey shoot.
For my money, though, the most flagrant demonstration of U.N. hypocrisy is how they have ignored the plight of ... Palestinians. Yes, Palestinians.
I'm talking about the millions of Palestinians who live in countries that have nothing to do with Jews or Israel. A country like, say, Lebanon.
This is what Mudar Zahran, a Palestinian refugee who fled Jordan and was granted asylum in the U.K., wrote last year in The Jerusalem Post:
"Lebanon, a country with some of the most hostile forces to Israel, has been holing up Palestinians inside camps for almost 30 years. Those camps do not have any foundations of livelihood or even sanitation."
Zahran writes that the "Lebanon atrocities toward the Palestinians have been tolerated by the international community, not only by the media," and that "many other Arab countries are no different than Lebanon in their ill-treatment and discrimination against the Palestinians."
When's the last time we heard of a Goldstone Report or a U.N. resolution in support of the poor, oppressed Palestinians who live in Arab lands? That's right, never.
The U.N. is the Picasso of hypocrisy. For that honor, I'd love to see a brave member introduce at their next general session a Resolution Against Hypocrisy, complete with an independent watchdog group that would report on violations like misplaced priorities, double standards, disproportionate criticism and just plain discrimination.
If they have time, they could also report on the slew of NGOs that claim to fight for Palestinian rights, but who completely ignore the millions of oppressed Palestinians who don't live inside or next to Israel.
This would be one busy watchdog group, especially if they report on the mind-bending hypocrisy of liberal groups pushing for boycotts against Israel while genocidal murderers and oppressors are let off the hook.
Of course, it'll take a while to push through this resolution. But for the women and little girls being raped and murdered every day in the dark corners of Africa, or the millions of Arabs across the Middle East whose decades-long suffering has nothing to do with Jews or Israel, or the many millions of other oppressed people around the globe whose daily torture is worlds away from the glamorous press lounge at the American Colony Hotel in East Jerusalem, it won't be a moment too soon.
Maybe President Obama can introduce the resolution on his next trip to Darfur, with a rape victim standing next to him.
