Israel Matzav

Another shameful UN moment

Accordingly, it is unfortunate that the US, even if it felt compelled by its treaty obligations to allow Ahmadinejad to attend the UN session, did not also feel compelled to arrest him under the Genocide Convention.

This convention, whose full name is the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, was signed and ratified by the US. Even national leaders do not enjoy immunity from prosecution. As the UN puts it, "Persons committing this crime shall be punished, whether they are constitutionally responsible rulers, public officials or private individuals."

President George W. Bush and Secretary-General Kofi Annan also spoke from the same UN podium on Tuesday. Bush's speech centered on his messages to the peoples of Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Iran, Syria and Darfur.

To Iranians, Bush said, "The greatest obstacle to this future is that your rulers have chosen to deny you liberty and to use your nation's resources to fund terrorism, and fuel extremism, and pursue nuclear weapons. The United Nations has passed a clear resolution requiring that the regime in Teheran meet its international obligations. Iran must abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions. ...We look to the day when you can live in freedom - and America and Iran can be good friends and close partners in the cause of peace."

These were the right emphases. Not so, Annan's. In his final speech as secretary-general to the gathered leaders, he also focused on this region.

"We might like to think of the Arab-Israeli conflict as just one regional conflict among many," he said. "But it is not. No other conflict carries such a powerful symbolic and emotional charge among people far removed from the battlefield...

"As long as the Security Council is unable to end this conflict, and the now nearly 40-year-old occupation, by bringing both sides to accept and implement its resolutions, so long will respect for the United Nations continue to decline. So long, too, will our impartiality be questioned... And so long will our devoted and courageous staff, instead of being protected by the blue flag, find themselves exposed to rage and violence, provoked by policies they neither control nor support."

With this, the UN's leader waved not a blue flag, but a white flag of surrender to the very forces he hoped to combat. Why is he blaming "both sides" for a war, not to establish a Palestinian state, but to destroy Israel? Why does he imply that Israel is provoking "rage and violence" against UN forces, rather than condemning that violence and the Arab war to destroy Israel of which it is a part?

The Security Council has indeed failed to enforce its resolutions because, time and again, it has stood silent as Israel is attacked and leapt into action to stop Israel from defending itself.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 7:25 PM