Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid on Sunday sent a letter to U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres demanding the immediate dissolution of the Human Rights Council’s Commission of Inquiry (COI) tasked with investigating Israel.
The letter, released by Lapid’s office, states: “Excellency, I call on you today to honor your word in this egregious case, to set the record straight. This cannot stand. Slurs about a ‘Jewish lobby’ that acts to ‘control’ the media are reminiscent of the darkest days of modern history.”
It continued: “The fight against anti-Semitism cannot be waged with words alone, it requires action. This is the time for action; it is time to disband the Commission. From (member of the COI) Mr. (Miloon) Kothari’s outrageous slurs to (member of the COI Navi) Pillay’s defense of the indefensible, this commission does not just endorse anti-Semitism—it fuels it.”
Lapid’s demand follows comments by Kothari that the media is controlled by the “Jewish lobby,” which join a string of previous anti-Semitic incidents and anti-Israel bias within the Commission, said Lapid in the statement.
In an interview last week with Mondoweiss contributor David Kattenburg, Kothari said: “We are very disheartened by the social media that is controlled largely by the Jewish lobby or specific NGOs.”
Lapid’s statement noted that representatives of several countries, including the United States, France, Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic and Austria, as well as the European Union, criticized Kothari’s remarks.
