Comment by tptacek
1 year ago
It may well be the case that Israel has a vested interest in discrediting the UN, but it's also pretty clear that the UN doesn't have much of an interest in establishing its own credibility. The Human Rights Council includes military dictatorships and countries responsible for unquestioned genocides. It has had a standing agenda item ("Item 7") regarding Palestine and the "occupied Arab territories"; Israel is the only country to receive such attention. The Special Rapporteur on Palestine, Francesa Albanese, has accused the US and Europe of being "subjugated by the Jewish lobby". The UN itself sponsors several organizations dedicated to the Israel/Palestine conflict, despite drastically more severe human rights issues elsewhere on the globe.
None of this is to defend any of the Netanyahu administrations actions in Gaza. I think these discussions on HN are largely cursed, and nobody is going to persuade anybody to "switch sides". You don't have to agree that the UN is, as Israel's supporters would say, so clearly biased against Israel as to be fatal to their credibility. But I don't think you can dismiss the charge easily. If you dig in, you're going to read some uncomfortable stuff.
but it's also pretty clear that the UN doesn't have much of an interest in establishing its own credibility.
That's a little glib though, since it's fundamentally not how the UN works.
It felt glib. Can you think of a better way to write it?
Probably not, plus as a former UN brat (DISCLOSURE!), this stuff tends to get my goat a little.
Since the org is huge, multipurpose and multifaceted (and often less than the sum of its parts), I'd say it's best to stay as specific as possible both when using some UN thing to buttress an argument or to critique the thing - so, what is the thing, by what org, person, representative, etc.
In this case, the specific thing is
an interview with a UN relief director who explained the retrospective examination of past casualty reporting that had happened
Which doesn't seem to be linked? From there the whole thing swerves into a discussion of 'The UN' which turns to vague generalities that are mostly (I think often unintentionally) recycled talking points. 'Israel seeks to discredit the UN' is a recycled talking point itself, of course. But I think 'HRC has bad members' is too - the UN is full of bad members. The Security Council has an aggressor state on it with veto power and everything! UN has a lot of orgs and items dedicated to the conflict? Sure, but Israel and the UN were almost born together and the conflict is one of the closest things the UN has to a foundational, OG issue - state formation, genocide, wars of aggression, right to defense, refugees, it's all there. Special Rapporteurs are kind of unserious (and why is there no Special Raconteur)? A real thing but doesn't seem clearly related to whatever interview the poster read.
Anyway, sorry for the grumptone, I just think substantive UN critique is such a fecund orchard of low hanging fruit there's not much point in settling for the frozen trope concentrate stuff.
6 replies →