Benjamin Netanyahu's cabinet followed in the footsteps of Donald Trump and ended its observer role in the bloc
The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Israel The United States announced on Wednesday that it had suspended its participation in the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), with which it has had differences for years regarding the situation in Palestine and other Arab territories.
When communicating his departure, Gideon Saar He accused the body of “obsessively demonising the only democracy in the Middle East” and of failing to fulfil its duties to defend rights.
“This body has focused on attacking a democratic country and spreading anti-Semitism rather than promoting Human Rights. The UNHRC has traditionally protected human rights abusers by allowing them to hide from scrutiny, instead demonizing” Israel, said the official, who insisted that “The discrimination against us is clear”.
According to Saar, the Jewish state is the “only country with an item on the agenda dedicated to it” and has been the subject of More than 100 condemnatory resolutions, a figure that represents more than those announced against Iran, Cuba, North Korea and Venezuela combined, and “more than 20% of all resolutions passed in the history of the Council.”
In the past, the agency has expressed its disagreement with Tel Aviv's stance on a range of issues, from Humanitarian assistance provided to Gaza, his statements on the Palestinian enclave, his war strategy in which it “uses hunger as a weapon and inflicts collective punishment on the Palestinian population” and even their methods of warfare that “are consistent with the characteristics of genocide”.
It is because of that “Israel will no longer accept this discrimination”, he concluded in the statement.
The news came out shortly after the president announced the day before Donald Trump did the same with the United States, and on the same day that he received the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office. Washington's order also extends to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), whose funding remains suspended.
“I have always felt that the UN has enormous potential, but is not complying with it at this time. For a long time it has been ineffectiveThere are high hopes for her but, to be honest, It is not well managed"Trump told reporters, as the White House released a statement noting that, as it has noted in the past, the UN Human Rights Council "has demonstrated a constant bias against Israel” and has Safeguarding nations such as Iran, Cuba and China, “despite their serious violations and abuses of human rights”.
The text also mentions a “deep anti-American bias” by several United Nations agencies and therefore justifies his departure.
During his first presidency, Trump had also withdrawn the United States from the UN Human Rights Council, but in January 2021, shortly after Joe Biden's arrival at the White House, Washington rejoined.
However, the UNHRC assured that as of January 1, 2025, neither of the two countries in question was "part of the 47 member States" but rather had “observer status”, so technically “they cannot withdraw from an intragovernmental body of which they are not a part.”
(With information from AFP, EFE and Europa Press)
Source: INFOBAE
Sa'ar with British Foreign Secretary David Lammy in Israel, 12 January 2025. Photo: Wikipedia – CC BY 2.0
It is a shame to no longer be part of an organization where Saudi Arabia is on the women's rights commission, and North Korea and Iran are on the commission for monitoring democracy.