Tuesday, June 13, 2017

The UNHRC is incompetent. It should be shut down


Watching the UN work can be like going to a circus. There are clowns everywhere.

This seems especially true at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC). This Council is supposed to protect human rights. But the short video you're about to see may suggest that UNHRC fails to protect anyone from rights abuse. 

For example, in the subject below, instead of addressing a human rights problem, the Council blames Israel for it. That blame assures that the problem will never be fixed--and the women in need will receive no assistance.

The video below is about a report called, 'Report on Violence against Women' in the Palestinian Authority (PA). This Report claims that, because Israel 'occupies' the PA, it alone is responsible for the violence you're about to hear about. 

The only saving grace for this clownish circus is a response to the Report by UN Watch's Hillel Neuer. In a moment, you'll hear him tear into the Report. You'll learn that the Report appears to have no research--no data--at all to support its anti-Israel accusations. 

His questions about the Report suggest that the UNHRC is so incompetent it doesn't understand the meaning of the words, 'professional research standards'. His questions also raise their own question: shouldn't an organization this incompetent be shut down before it really harms people in need? 

Towards the end of this video, you'll hear a rebuttal to Hillel Neuer. The woman doing the rebuttal says that each state is responsible for the human rights issues that affect violence against women--and they must fix those abuses (or, something like that). That's fair enough. But why does Israel have that responsibility for abuses in the PA? 

Despite what the UNHRC claims, Israel doesn't occupy the PA. It plays no role in private family issues within the PA.

The PA governs itself, not Israel (this is how we know Israel doesn't 'occupy' the PA). It's the PA that's responsible for the family issues of PA families--not Israel. 

If the UNHRC is trying to lay PA governance responsibilities on Israel, that's an outrageous suggestion, especially in a political climate where the PA doesn't want anything to do with Israel. Only those who are incompetent would make such a suggestion.

But it's an interesting suggestion nonetheless because it allows those who would demonize Israel the opportunity to service two important purposes: first, to demonize Israel; and second, to absolve the PA from any responsibility for problems it should be addressing, but isn't. 

It's a neat trick. It's great for the PA (when blaming Israel, the PA doesn't have to fix anything). But it's a tactic that perpetuates human rights abuses in the PA.

Of course, that's okay, too. Leaving human rights abuses unaddressed in the PA provides more fodder to continue to blame Israel down the road. 

This video was posted June 12, 2017. It's 3:57 long. I took it from youtube. I believe it's from the pro-Israel NGO, unwatch, with which Hillel Neuer (the English speaker in the video) is associated. This video is about Hillel Neuer at the UN. Watch:





The PA Representative here says that the "colonial Israeli military occupation is the major obstacle for Palestinian women. Only an  end to the occupation will bring a true and lasting empowerment to Palestinian women" (0:20-0:30 in the video). As Neuer suggests, that's an outrageous assertion, not least because the Report provides no data to show this assertion is true. 

Naturally, in the clown-town called the UNHRC, the obvious doesn't exist: Islamic preachers on official Palestinian TV (i.e., officially under the control of the PA) give instructions on how to beat your wife; that televised advice doesn't play any role in PA violence against women? Where's the data to prove that?

The Report provides none.

 As Neuer points out, for these incompetents, religious or cultural influences in the PA play no role the abuse of women in PA homes. The only possible explanation for PA wife beating is 'Israel colonial military occupation'.

The mindlessness of this claim is startling, to say the least. 

When you listen to Hillel Neuer--and those in the video demonizing Israel--you can appreciate three things:

(1) The only voice of reason at the UNHRC is Hillel Neuer; and,

(2) The hatred of Israel at the UN is so irrational it's become 'clownish'; and,

(3) This clownishness is not funny. It means that the suffering of these women will go on. PA men will beat their wives, the PA will feel no need to intervene--and the abuses will continue unabated.

The UNHRC isn't kidding. Demonizing Israel is clearly far more important than fixing human rights abuses. 

That makes the UNHRC worse than incompetent because it abandons its mandate to push a malicious political agenda. That's not just incompetence. It's a betrayal of the women and children it's supposed to protect.

In the name of human rights, the UNHRC should be shut down.

No comments:

Post a Comment