Where’s the Coverage? UN Head Admits Anti-Israel Bias

The outgoing head of the United Nations admitted in a Dec. 16, 2016 speech that his organization is biased against Israel. The remarks by U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon went largely unreported by major U.S. news media outlets.

Mr. Ban told the U.N. Security Council:

“Over the last decade, I have argued that we cannot have a bias against Israel at the U.N. Decades of political maneuvering have create a disproportionate number of resolutions, reports and committees against Israel. In many cases, instead of helping the Palestinian issue, this reality has foiled the ability of the U.N. to fulfill its role effectively.”

According to The Independent, a U.K.-based newspaper, Israel’s Ambassador to the U.N. Danny Danon, stated that the United Nations chief “had admitted the clear truth” and his organization’s hypocrisy towards the Jewish state had “broken records over the past decade (“Ban Ki-moon says UN has ‘disproportionate’ focus on Israel,” Dec. 17).”

As CAMERA has frequently noted, the U.N. has a history of anti-Israel discrimination. According to U.N. Watch, a Geneva-based non-profit organization, in 2016 alone, the U.N. General Assembly passed more than 20 resolutions singling out the Jewish state for opprobrium. This, in a year in which the Islamic State and Syrian-dictator Bashar al-Assad—supported by Iran and Security Council member Russia—have carried out mass slaughter in the Middle East.

After this admission, Mr. Ban stated, “Israel needs to understand that a democratic state which is run by the rule of law, which continues to militarily occupy the Palestinian people, will still generate criticism and calls to hold her accountable.” Yet, as CAMERA noted in a March 9, 2013 Washington Times Op-Ed, Mr. Ban does not “apply a consistent legal yardstick to Arab municipalities in the Jewish state, which he does not denounce as illegal.”

Clear-cut occupations such as Morocco’s conquest of the Western Sahara, China’s takeover of Tibet, and Turkey’s seizure of Northern Cyprus, among others, are often given short shift by the U.N. and the media (“Hypocrisy is Thy Name, Blaming Israel Thy Game,” CAMERA, Aug. 19, 2014).

Mr. Ban’s brief moment of candor—delivered as he completes his final term as U.N. Secretary General—was refreshing. However, his knee jerk response to follow it by singling Israel out was, unfortunately, more of the same.