The United Nations and its agencies have an “appalling record of targeting Israel while looking askance when it comes to China, North Korea and Iran, and other gross violators of human rights,” Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), who is serving his 22nd term, told JNS last week.
The congressman, who chairs the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Global Health, Global Human Rights and International Organizations, spoke with JNS after the subcommittee held a Nov. 8 hearing on “United Nations’s Bigotry Towards Israel: UNRWA Antisemitism Poisons Palestinian Youth.” (UNRWA is the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.)
“We need to awaken the world to the tragedy of what has happened but also the complicity of the United Nations and its specialized agencies, including the U.N. Human Rights Council,” Smith told JNS.
The hearing addressed “what could be done vis-à-vis UNRWA, which is, unfortunately, an incubator of hate for young people especially, who then become 14-, 15-year-old terrorists because they’ve been taught since they were four to hate Jews and to hate Israel,” he said.
Those who testified at the hearing included UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer; Jonathan Schanzer, senior vice president for research at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies; and Jonathan Lincoln, interim director of the Center for Jewish Civilization.
“Make no mistake, antisemitic bigotry is at the root of the U.N.’s hostility to Israel, which is ugly, evil and manifests itself in almost every U.N. entity,” Smith said at the hearing. “The United Nations is unquestionably the world’s foremost legitimizer of antisemitism, including in its most virulent and violent forms.”
“The monstrous and genocidal atrocities we have seen pouring out of Gaza since Oct. 7 are antisemitic hate crimes, the logical consequence of the unbridled antisemitism fomented and enabled by the United Nations,” he added.
‘Distributing hateful content to students’
“Teachers and schools at the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which runs education and social services for Palestinians, regularly call to murder Jews, and create teaching materials that glorify terrorism, encourage martyrdom, demonize Israelis and incite antisemitism,” Neuer said at the hearing.
“In 2022 alone, UNRWA received $344 million in U.S. funding,” he continued. “Yet a March 2023 report by UN Watch and Impact-SE identified 133 UNRWA educators and staff who were found to promote hate and violence on social media, and an additional 82 teachers and other staff affiliated with 30 UNRWA schools who were involved in drafting and distributing hateful content to students.”
Schanzer testified that the United Nations doesn’t recognize Hamas or Hezbollah as a foreign terrorist organization, as the United States does. “That means U.N. resources can be and regularly are provided to members of those terrorist groups,” he said.
Duvi Honig, founder and CEO of the Orthodox Jewish Chamber of Commerce, who met with Smith in his congressional office after the hearing, told JNS there is “an alarming rise of antisemitic incidents and the urgent need for actionable solutions.”
Of the United Nations, he said: “It is inexcusable that Israel continues to be singled out and targeted, facing unfair criticism while other countries are allowed to evade scrutiny.”
