In a written statement, the Emergency Committee for Israel (ECI) blasts the U.N. Security Council’s attack on Israel. “As Arab governments are violently suppressing peaceful protests, the United Nations Security Council has, predictably, nothing to say,” ECI says. The statement goes on to note the protests in Egypt, Bahrain, Libya, and Yemen, as well as Hezbollah’s actions in Lebanon, and notes that the sole subject of the U.N. Security Council “is once again attacking Israel.”
ECI also expresses its disappointment with President Obama. It ends by asking, “So, in addition to vetoing the anti-Israel resolution in the Security Council, why shouldn’t the Obama administration convene the Security Council to deal with a genuine and urgent problem – the murder of protesters by dictatorial regimes in the Middle East? And if that’s impossible, why are we paying any attention, and offering any support, to the UN at all?”
The Security Council’s response? Instead of demanding peaceful reforms from dictatorial regimes, or warning Iran against its provocations, or emphasizing the need for political and social improvement in the Arab world, it is once again attacking Israel.
President Obama has claimed that greater American engagement with the UN can make it a useful organization. Yet so far, engagement has provided almost nothing in the way of serious change. The events of this week give President Obama an opportunity to demand that the UN address real problems, not fashionable obsessions. So, in addition to vetoing the anti-Israel resolution in the Security Council, why shouldn’t the Obama administration convene the Security Council to deal with a genuine and urgent problem – the murder of protesters by dictatorial regimes in the Middle East? And if that’s impossible, why are we paying any attention, and offering any support, to the UN at all?
