UN versus Israel: Jerusalem cries foul
UN Commission of Inquiry and WHO stand accused not only of bias, but of collusion with Hamas.
It would be an understatement to say Israelis no longer trust the United Nations.
n what will come as a surprise to no one, the United Nations has officially joined the chorus of voices charging Israel with committing “war crimes” in the Gaza Strip, even in the course of its recent successful hostage rescue operation.
In a new report published on Wednesday, a UN Commission of Inquiry called out Hamas’s savage invasion of southern Israel on October 7 of last year, but echoed an earlier assessment by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres that it “didn’t happen in a vacuum,” and was instead the latest instance of violence in a “cycle of violence” created by Israel’s “unlawful occupation of Palestinian territory.”
This despite that fact that for 17 years prior to October 7, Israel did not occupy one centimeter of the Gaza Strip.
Parroting Hamas
The UN report accuses Israel of “intent to cause maximum damage” by using heavy weaponry in densely-populated areas. It makes no mention of Hamas using the civilian population as a human shield. Nor does it acknowledge the lengths to which Israel has gone to move civilians out of combat zones and to limit casualties.
Assessments by military experts have attested to the success of Israel’s efforts in this regard, resulting in an unprecedented near 1:1 ratio in civilians-to-combatants killed in a dense urban setting.
Rather, the UN portrays the situation as Israel heartlessly and deliberately putting women and children in harm’s way.
The report goes on to suggest that the death toll in the Gaza war is exceptional, ignoring far higher numbers of deaths in recent conflicts in Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Sudan.
The commission also felt the need to highlight the claim that Israel had applied the so-called “Hannibal Directive” on October 7, deliberately killing at least 14 of its own soldiers and civilians to prevent them being taken captive. The Hannibal Directive was cancelled by the IDF in 2016.
All of these charges are almost word-for-word reiterations of Hamas claims.
More double standards
Just one example of a blatant double standards in the UN report is its criticism of Israel for failing to better protect its own citizens, while including not a word about Hamas using the civilians of Gaza as cover.
It also takes at face value unverified claims by Hamas that Israeli soldiers have sexually abused civilians in Gaza. And this from the same United Nations that for months after the October 7 atrocities failed to accept the heavily-documented sexual abuse of Israelis at the hands of the Palestinians.
‘Abhorrent and immoral’
The permanent UN Commission of Inquiry into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict established in 2021 has exhibited systematic anti-Israel discrimination, charged Jerusalem on Wednesday.
According to Israeli officials, the commission disregards critical context and evidence provided by Israel, while disproportionately focusing on alleged Israeli violations.
A statement from the Israeli mission accuses the UN of trying to “justify the heinous terrorist attack of October 7 by contextualizing it through the lens of the Palestinian narrative. It makes no mention of decades-long terrorism, or the continuous rocket fire across Israeli territory.”
“Israel,” the statement continues, “rejects the abhorrent and immoral accusations leveled against the IDF, both with regards to the military operation in Gaza and its initial response against Hamas terrorists in Israel. Hamas is a lawless terrorist organization. Israel is a democratic country that is committed to the rule of law.”
Israeli ambassador Meirav Eilon Shahar added: “The CoI has once again proven that its actions are all in the service of a narrow-led political agenda against Israel. Today’s reports confirm what we have repeatedly said: the Pillay Commission will never do justice to the Israeli victims of Palestinian terrorism.”
See no evil, hear no evil
In a related development, Israel says the World Health Organization (WHO) is colluding with Hamas by ignoring evidence of the militant group’s use of hospitals for military purposes. During a speech to the WHO’s executive board, Ambassador Shahar presented evidence that Hamas exploits medical facilities in Gaza to shield its operations, thus endangering civilian lives and violating international laws of warfare.
The WHO has firmly denied any collusion, maintaining that its primary focus remains the health and well-being of civilians in conflict zones.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus responded emotionally to Israel’s accusations, emphasizing that the organization does not support any form of violence or terrorism. He highlighted the immense suffering of civilians, especially children, caught in the conflict, and called for greater international cooperation to address the humanitarian crisis without politicizing health issues.
He did not address the documented presence of Hamas weapons and facilities, including tunnels and bunkers, found at most of Gaza’s 36 hospitals.
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