UN Human Rights Council
Yesterday, Israel refused to attend a United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) review of its human rights record becoming the first country ever to boycott the Universal Periodic Review process. Under this process, all 193 member states of the United Nations take part in a regular review of its human rights record. Israel participated in its last scheduled review in December, 2008.
Al Jazeera reports Israel’s decision to end contact with the UNHRC followed an announcement last year that the council would be investigating Israeli settlements as a human rights violation:
Israel cut all ties with the 47-member state council last March after the body announced that it would probe how Israeli illegal settlements may be infringing on the rights of the Palestinians.
Israel has come under widespread criticism for ramping up its construction of illegal settlements in the Palestinian territories, notably in the outskirts of Jerusalem.
Earlier on Tuesday, an Israeli foreign ministry spokesman told AFP the country intended to boycott the meeting.
“We cut all our contacts with the council last March, including the current activity,” Yigal Palmor said, stressing: “Our policy has not changed.”
In response to Israel’s refusal to appear, a coalition of 15 Israeli and Palestinian human rights organizations released the following statement:
15 Israeli and Palestinian organisations warn of far-reaching consequences of Israel’s obstruction of UN human rights mechanisms
28 January 2013
15 Israeli and Palestinian human rights organisations today warned of the far-reaching consequences of Israel’s refusal to fully cooperate with the United Nations (UN). On the morning of Israel’s second Universal Periodic Review (UPR), scheduled for Tuesday 29 January, it remains increasingly unlikely that it intends to participate.
This lack of transparency will not only mean that Israel avoids rigorous criticism of its violations of international law, but that the entire UPR system will be undermined by the loss of its two fundamental principles: equality and universality.
In May 2012, Israel formally announced its decision to “suspend its contact with the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), the Human Rights Council (the Council) and its subsequent mechanisms”.
Israel reportedly met with the Council President His Excellency Remigiusz A. Henczel in January 2013 and discussed a postponement of its UPR. However, as no formal request has yet been made, the Council agreed to proceed as scheduled and to consider on the day what steps to take if the Israeli delegation does not attend.
These exceptional circumstances have created uncertainty and forced some civil society organisations to revise or limit their engagement with the review process due to the risk of investing necessarily significant resources into a process that may not take place. Thus, a key component of the UPR process – civil society engagement – has been severely hampered.
Through this uncertainty, Israel and the Council are setting a dangerous precedent on the international stage, one that could be followed by other States refusing to engage with the UN in order to avoid critical appraisals. Israel’s decision to disengage from core mechanisms of the United Nations human rights system has, in effect, resulted in preferential treatment. All but one of the 193 UN Member States have attended their UPR as scheduled; in that single instance the State of Haiti was unable to attend due to the humanitarian crisis caused by the 2010 earthquake. Israel should not receive any benefits or concessions for its efforts to undermine the system of the UN and, in particular, its human rights system.
To the contrary, the Council should ensure the unobstructed process of Israel’s UPR in accordance with the principles and standards set in the UPR mechanism, thereby reasserting the condition that human rights are more important than political or diplomatic considerations.
Moreover, Israel’s move to suspend cooperation with the Council and the OHCHR must be viewed within the context of its ongoing refusal to respect the decisions, resolutions and mechanisms of the UN. Consecutive Israeli governments have refused to recognise the State’s obligations under international human rights law with regard to the Palestinian population of the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt), obligations repeatedly reaffirmed in statements by UN treaty bodies.
Israel also rejects the de jure applicability of the Fourth Geneva Convention, incumbent upon it as the Occupying Power, in defiance of numerous UN resolutions, the 2004 International Court of Justice Advisory Opinion on the Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the oPt, and countless statements issued by governments worldwide.
In 2009, Israel declined to cooperate with the UN Fact-finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, headed by Justice Richard Goldstone. Justice Goldstone repeatedly called on Israel to engage, to no avail. More recently, in 2012, the UN Fact-finding Mission on Israeli Settlements in the oPt was denied entry into the territory to collect testimonies. The Mission joined a long list of UN Special Rapporteurs and the Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, to whom Israel has also refused entry. Furthermore, since his appointment as Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights on Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, Mr. Richard Falk has not been allowed to enter the oPt to carry out his work.
Within this context, 15 human rights organisations call on the Council to take a firm stand consistent with the seriousness of Israel’s obstructive actions to date.
The organisations singed to this statement are: Adalah – The Legal Center for Arab Minorities in Israel, Addameer Prisoners’ Support and Human Rights Association, Aldameer Association for Human Rights, Arab Association for Human Rights, Al-Haq, Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, Badil Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights, Defence for Children International – Palestine Section, Ensan Center for Human Rights and Democracy, Hurryyat – Centre for Defense of Liberties and Civil Rights, Jerusalem Center for Legal Aid and Human Rights, Physicians for Human Rights – Israel, Ramallah Center for Human Rights Studies, Women’s Centre for Legal Aid and Counselling.
Above the law. Above accountability.
UNHCR is dominated by dictatorships and Islamic tyrannies.
Its one sided obsession with a small democratic country has been used to divert public attention from real human rights abuses committed by Israel’s enemies.
Israel will not cooperate with a kangaroo court that has made up its mind to pronounce Israel guilty in advance and which has subverted the principles of universality, impartiality and due process in its giving special attention to the Jewish State reserved for no other country.
Israel will not give its enemies a platform to harass it and to undermine its core vital national interests. As a sovereign nation, Israel reserves the right to decide on the nature and extent of its cooperation with international bodies.
I remember in March Israel raised objections to the membership being biased and the UNHCR’s belief that settlement activity is an automatic human rights violation. I think the best thing for the UNHCR would be to listen and respond in a fair and balanced manner to charges of bias. Israel is officially on record as rejecting the UNHCR institutionally because of bias. The last thing in the world they would want to do is take a firm and uncompromising stand.
Once the relationship has deteriorated to the point of official rejection as a matter of policy what’s the point of being uncompromising? The point, unless the goal is cheap mockery, is to get Israel reinvested in the process.
Good report and to add to that is this one saying the review has been deferred…don’t know if it’s accurate.
The compliant of zionist that Israel is focused on disproportionately is due to the fact that Israel is disproportionately protected by the world’s super power from having to listen to much less account for their violations…so being a ‘special case’ does attract more attention and criticism.
I can only say that this typical hubris and ever escalating disrespect for everyone and all world bodies by Israel is actually good…..if it helps speeds up and hopefully increases their at least diplomatic isolation by other countries. Israel needs to be alone and the US needs to be isolated with them. I remember a long, long time ago when I said the aim of Israel–the aim of zionist like Kristol was to set up the world power struggle as ISR’Merica vr. The World…….and it’s getting closer to that all the time.
Columnists Content Section
Israel Unilaterally Withdraws From U.N. Rights Review
by Ali Gharib Jan 29, 2013 3:15 PM EST
There can be little doubt that with all the human rights violations out there in the world, the U.N.’s Human Rights Council has a disproportionate focus on Israel. This is not, of course, to say that Israel does not commit any human rights violations, and that such violations should not be pursued by the Council, but rather that the constant focus on the Jewish State—and it is very constant—raises questions of proportionality. But some of the functions of the Human Rights Council don’t suffer from these troubling flaws; some of its functions aren’t plagued by disproportionate ire directed at a single country. One such function is the Universal Periodic Review, and the universality is right there in the name. But this is precisely the function of the Rights Council that Israel declined to participate in today, offering no reason and asking for an extension (which was granted).
Sandro Campardo / AP Photo
We often hear of a double standard against Israel, but this was not the case with the Universal Periodic Review. Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from the process is, in this case, actually a double standard in Israel’s favor: it is the first country, since the review was implemented in 2005, to fail to show up and not offer a reason (Haiti was once a no-show, but offered an excuse). So Israel refused to participate in perhaps the one part of the Rights Council that, according to its own procedures, can actually not be anti-Israel.
Here’s Mark Leon Goldberg’s explanation at U.N. Dispatch of how the Review works:
It requires that all member states undergo a review of their human rights records every four years, no matter what. The Universal Periodic Review does not result in any resolutions condemning or praising a country, but it does oblige countries to face international scrutiny of their internal human rights situations. This forces countries to respond to specific criticisms, putting governments on the record in regards to alleged human rights abuses. The review also offers recommendations on how a country may improve its human rights record.
Why is this so important? Precisely because there are human rights violations in Israel that do need to be addressed, and the non-biased environs of the Universal Periodic Review seem the perfect place to do that. The Universal Periodic Review mechanisms not only prevent this bias, but, as Goldberg argued, also hold the potential for improvements at the margins: the Review “can be a tool to effectively press certain governments to live up to international human rights standards,” he wrote. “And, if those governments (read, Iran) chose to reject these recommendations, they will find themselves isolated even further.” But instead Israel is isolating itself.
Goldberg’s also written that the U.S. should not fear the Universal Periodic Review. Neither should Israel. One hopes Israeli cooperation is forthcoming when the Council returns to the deferred review in October of November.”
The notion that Jews don’t need human rights because they have the IDF is very sad.