The UN Human Rights Council has proven itself blatantly anti-Israel time and time again. Now it wants to investigate the Jewish State for alleged “war crimes,” but Israel refuses to subject itself to the UN’s “kangaroo court.”  

Israel has decided to bar the entry of a UN commission of inquiry, which is in the region ostensibly to investigate alleged war crimes committed by the Jewish state during Operation Protective Edge. The Commission has no intention of investigating Hamas terror against Israel’s civilian population.

The UN mission, headed by Canadian anti-Israel legalist William Schabas, is currently waiting in Jordan.

Israel’s foreign ministry officially announced on Wednesday that it has no intention of cooperating with a UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) probe.

In a statement to the media, the foreign ministry said it already is obvious that the probe would find Israel guilty. The commission’s mandate focuses on Israeli actions rather than on those of Hamas, and the Council itself has a history of hostile action toward Israel.

The foreign ministry further stated that the decision was made because of the UNHRC’s “obsessive hostility” toward Israel and its “one-sided mandate.” It also cited anti-Israel statements made by inquiry head William Schabas as a factor in the move.

“While Hamas fired thousands of rockets toward Israel, the UN Human Rights Council decided it would determine in advance Israel’s guilt and set up an investigative committee to serve as a rubber stamp to its known positions,” a ministry statement said.

History of Anti-Israel Bias

Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman.
(Photo: Yossi Zamir/Flash 90)

Israel has previously dismissed the commission of inquiry as a “kangaroo court” and said it will not cooperate with the investigation.

Schabas has a history of anti-Israel statements. He had called in the past for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former president Shimon Peres to stand trial at the International Criminal Court in The Hague for war crimes.

Speaking in the past at the Russell Tribunal on Palestine, Schabas stated his “profound belief that international law can be used to demonstrate and underscore the violations committed by the State of Israel…who have perpetrated international crimes against the people of Palestine.”

According to Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, a Geneva-based NGO, “You can’t spend several years calling for the prosecution of someone and then suddenly act as his judge. It’s absurd — and a violation of the minimal rules of due process applicable to UN fact-finding missions.”

Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman stated in September that the UNHRC is a political body dominated by countries that are hostile to Israel and that violate human rights in their own countries on a regular basis.

“The Council’s biased treatment of Israel is only one manifestation of the return of the world’s oldest prejudices,” he declared, alluding to anti-Semitism.

The UNHRC has a history of anti-Israel bias on the one hand, and no address of human rights violations in the Council members’ countries. How do you think Israel should respond to this alleged fact-finding mission?

Author: United with Israel Staff