Israel Isn’t the Only Naughty Boy Out There

Posted by: Avinash on Friday, June 1st, 2007

Berkeley and the Bay Area is renowned for its disproportionate Palestine-loving and Israel-bashing, as evidenced by protest rallies to the right. As a sensible editor, we find these rallies ridiculous considering the types of signs you find there. Far-left and far-right elements in this nation might have disparate ideas about why they hate Jews, but hate is hate nonetheless. So why is the latter the main focus of the media while the former can incite violent reactions against the Semitic people?So we’re happy whenever a Cal alum decides to stick up for the Star of David. Someone needs to in this place. And he’s making his stand in a more established place, where love for Jews is perhaps in even shorter supply.

It was author Dr. John Gray who opined that men are from Mars, women from Venus.

But it was a Syrian ambassador to the United Nations Human Rights Council who decried Israeli soldiers as “invaders from the planet Mars.”You may not have caught that bit of diplomacy.

But thousands have, thanks to an Internet video of the outrageous utterances of representatives from oppressive regimes at the U.N. Human Rights Council compiled in part by Toby Frankenstein.The 23-year-old San Francisco native and U.C. Berkeley alum is in the midst of a one-year tenure in Geneva as a fellow for U.N. Watch, a nonprofit that aims to convince the Human Rights Council to start recognizing abuses in the 193 nations in the world not named “Israel.” Barring that, the group at least hopes to publicize the shortcomings and Israel-bashing of that and other U.N. bodies.

Last year, Frankenstein notes, the Human Rights Council passed 12 country-specific resolutions. Nine of them condemned Israel and three bemoaned the situation in Darfur without laying any blame on the Sudanese government.

Of course, he continues, that’s not so surprising considering that 17 of the council’s 47 seats are held by nations in the Islamic bloc, and almost uniformly vote in unison. Nations not toeing the anti-Israel line are treated harshly; Canadian resolutions were immediately buried in committee after the representative said he would not support a statement condemnatory of Israel.

“We understand we’re not going to get Saudi Arabia to come around on the issue of Israel. But that’s not our goal,” explains Frankenstein, in the Bay Area recently to visit his family for a week in late May before heading back to Geneva (where his college education in political economy and French language is serving him well).

“Our goal is to highlight what’s going on so people can take action and write their members of Congress.”

We’re conflicted on the relevance of a governing body like the UN. For one, these resolutions are essentially popularity contests of who has the most allies, so U.S.-backed Israel sticks out like a sore thumb while the Arab nations (who we all know are human rights darlings) gang up on them with virulence. So why not let them join in on Israel’s party? Let them all cut up their parts of the pie.

Here is one of the videos in question. The rest can be found here:

Any nations you want to add to your bad list (serious suggestions or funny)? Do you really think Israel is evil incarnate? Let us know in the comments.

Israel-bashers beware: Young S.F. native keeps tabs on U.N. [Jewish News Weekly]
HumanRightsUN’s Videos [YouTube]
(Image from Zombie Time)



Topics: Alumni, UC Berkeley, Video, World

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