2013 Briefing Book - Print Version - Aipac

ISRAEL AT RISK
repeatedly held “Emergency Special Sessions” that focus solely on the Arab conflict with Israel.
Although these types of sessions were originally conceived in 1950 for emergencies like the Korean
War, they have since then focused primarily on condemning Israel, while numerous other world
emergencies, such as the genocide in Darfur and the Syrian regime’s killing of its own people, go
virtually ignored.
Likewise, three unique U.N. entities are dedicated to promoting the Palestinian cause
and, consequently, to repeatedly condemning Israel. They include the Special Committee
to Investigate Israeli Practices Affecting the Human Rights of the Palestinian People and
Other Arabs of the Occupied Territories, the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable
Rights of the Palestinian People and the Division for Palestinian Rights within the U.N.
Secretariat. Together, these three agencies spend millions of dollars each year to spread anti-
Israel propaganda and engage in some of the worst anti-Israel activity. The United States has
consistently condemned this behavior.
SINGLING OUT ISRAEL ON HUMAN RIGHTS
Created in March 2006 to replace the former U.N. Commission on Human Rights, the new
U.N. Human Rights Council maintains an endemic hostility to Israel, combined with hands-off
treatment of some of the world’s most notorious human rights abusers.
The new Council’s first session culminated with only one country-specific decision—a call for reports
and consideration of “Israeli human rights violations” in Palestinian and “other occupied Arab
territories.” Less than one week later, the Council convened an emergency session devoted to “Israeli
military operations against Palestinian civilians.” As the Israel Defense Forces sought to rescue
Corporal Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier kidnapped by Hamas days earlier (on June 25, 2006) and
eventually released as part of a prisoner exchange between the terrorist group and Israel in October
2011, the Council passed a resolution condemning Israeli actions and dispatched an “urgent factfinding
mission” to the region to report on Israeli human rights abuses. The resolution ignored
Hamas’ kidnapping and the daily barrage of Qassam rockets striking Israeli cities.
QUESTIONING ISRAEL’S RIGHT TO SELF-DEFENSE
This process of condemnation and delegitimization was renewed in the wake of fighting between
Hamas and Israel in 2008. Israel had launched defensive operations in Gaza after enduring
thousands of rocket attacks against its civilians. An ill-conceived and biased fact-finding commission,
appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Council, released a report—known as the Goldstone Report
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