Israel Matzav

Obama's human rights charade continues

The Obama administration continues its charade that the United Nations 'Human Rights Council' is actually concerned about human rights.

Last year the UN decided to annualize Council membership and begin terms in January rather than September. It was anticipated that this would also move the election cycle from the spring to the fall of 2012. But since the U.S. is now completing its first three-year term, President Obama’s Council re-election bid threatens to coincide with the final stretch of his presidential re-election campaign. Rather than risk having to defend his UN engagement charade at an extremely visible moment, American diplomats are working overtime pressing for May 2012 elections.

Interestingly, a second Council term would only start January 2013 and staggered elections would allow the U.S. simply to stand down now and run next year instead.

Given that the Bush administration vehemently refused to lend legitimacy to the Council by becoming a member, Obama’s maneuver is either a brazen attempt to shove membership down the throat of a future Republican administration or a cocky assumption of a Democratic win in November 2012.

At the same time, the administration isn’t taking re-election to the Council for granted. This helps explain a few more recent pro-UN and anti-Israel chess moves.

Two weeks ago President Obama put $79 million dollars in his budget for UNESCO and began pressing Congress to remove a prohibition on American funding to the organization.

The congressional injunction had kicked in after UNESCO pre-emptively granted Palestine “statehood” status. The congressional move had successfully put the brakes on Palestinian attempts to achieve statehood via the UN without committing to peaceful co-existence with Israel. By seeking to overturn it, the president makes clear that burnishing his pro-UN credentials is his higher priority -- and worrying about increasing the daylight between his administration and Israel is a distant second.

If there's anyone reading this blog who supports Israel and is nevertheless going to vote for Obama, could you please explain why in the comments? It seems to me that support for Israel and support for Obama are incompatible.

Read the whole thing.

Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Obama's obsession with Palestinians, UNESCO, United Nations Human Rights Council

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:25 PM