Liberman: Israel, U.S. must leave UNHRC over its Gaza support

The UN body is set to discuss the deadly protests in Gaza and the opening of the US embassy in Jerusalem Friday.

By TOVAH LAZAROFF, JPOST.COM STAFF
Updated: MAY 17, 2018 16:03
Avigdor Liberman, Defense Minister speaking at the 7th Annual JPost Conference in NY (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM)
Avigdor Liberman, Defense Minister speaking at the 7th Annual JPost Conference in NY
(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM)
Israel and the US must immediately withdraw from the United Nations Human Rights Council to protest its decision to hold an emergency session Friday against Israeli actions on the Gaza border,  Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman wrote on Twitter Thursday morning.
"Israel is under a double attack," Liberman wrote in the post. "A terror attack from Gaza and an attack of hypocrisy headed by the United Nations Human Rights Council."
The Human Rights Council's condemnations of Israel, Liberman wrote, "are meant to deter Israel from protecting itself. They will not succeed."
"We must stop permitting this celebration of hypocrisy," the defense minister wrote, "and immediately withdraw from the Human Rights Council, and work diligently so that the United States joins us in this step.”
UN warns of more Gaza violence, condemns Israel"s use of force, May 15, 2018 (Reuters)
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Friday’s session has been “convened per an official request submitted this evening by Palestine and the United Arab Emirates, on behalf of the Arab Group of States, which has been supported by 26 States thus far," the UNHRC said.
It will address additional issues with respect to Israeli actions in the West Bank and east Jerusalem and is likely to also take up the opening of the US embassy in Jerusalem this week.
Friday’s meeting in Geneva will be the 28th special session the UNHRC has held since its inception in 2006 and the 8th that has focused on Israeli actions against the Palestinians. The last one on Israel was in July 2014 in the middle of the Gaza war.

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The UNHRC has held more special sessions on Israel than any other country. The only other one country on which it has focused such scrutiny is Syria on which there has been five sessions. None have been held on Iran.
It has also approved more resolution against Israel than against any other country.
The Trump Administration has repeatedly threatened to pull out of the council unless it undergoes a process of reform and stops its biased treatment of Israel.
But it is presumed to have put that threat on hold as long as the UNHRC refrains from publishing its black list of companies both in Israel and abroad with business engagement in areas of the country located over the pre-1967 lines including the West Bank, east Jerusalem and the Golan Heights.
When Liberman was foreign minister, he cut Israel diplomatic ties to the UNHRC in 2012, but those ties were re-established in 2013. Israel however, boycotts UNHRC sessions that it holds to be biased, such as the debates against Israel which the UNHRC is mandated to hold during every session under Agenda Item 7.


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