« Bad Tidings for McCain, GOP in new Poll | Chinese Police Fire into Crowd of Tibetan Monks - Again »
April 4, 2008
Israel, US to Coordinate Boycott of Durban II
According to Ha'aretz, Israel and the United States will work together on seeking a compromise with organizers on whether to boycott the United Nations Conference on Racism known as Durban II to be held next year.
The first Durban conference was a disaster. Instead of discussing racism, the delegates and NGO's in attendance turned the meeting into an anti-Israel and anti-American free for all. It got so bad that the United States delegation walked out of the UN sponsored proceedings.
This time, the US and Israel wish to avoid that kind of nonsense and are working together to see if some kind of accomodation can be reached prior to the meeting:
Israel and the U.S. decided a few weeks ago to boycott the Durban II conference scheduled for early 2009 and likely to harshly criticize Israel's human rights record unless they receive firm guarantees that the event will not turn into anti-Israel festival.Is there any point in trying to work with the Arabs on modifying the agenda?
According to a senior government official, the joint decision was made after discussions among senior U.S. State Department and local Foreign Ministry officials, and after being raised in talks between Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
[snip]
Jerusalem estimates that conference organizers will try to blur the real agenda until the last minute to draw in as many UN members as possible. "We are concerned this time too there will be criticism and an anti-Semitic attack," a Foreign Ministry official said.
"What can you expect from a conference whose organizers include Cuba, Iran and North Korea."
On Wednesday, many major U.S. newspapers ran an advertisement signed by 25 public figures including former politicians, religious leaders and intellectuals, calling on the government to boycott the conference. Signatories included Nobel Prize laureate Elie Wiesel, former CIA chief James Woolsey and law professor Alan Dershowitz.
The signatories called on Rice to announce a boycott of the conference, denouncing it as a platform for anti-Semitism "slated to encourage hatred of Israel and the U.S."
Canada doesn't think so. They have already announced that they will boycott the meeting. Indeed, it seems a lost cause to attempt any change in attitudes of Arab states toward Israel and much of the rest of the world toward America. If that is the case, expect both Israel and the US to refuse attendance.
To comment on this or any other American Thinker article or blog, you must be a subscriber to our ad-free service. Login to your subscription to access the comments section. You can subscribe on a monthly basis for $6.79 a month or for a year at $69.99
Login
Subscribe / Change PwdAd Free / Commenting Login
FOLLOW US ON
Recent Articles
- Trump’s Ukraine Gambit
- Vanceism and Post-USAID American Foreign Politics — Implications for Georgia
- Why Arab Countries Do Not Want Gazans
- America’s Last Chance
- Georgetown’s Hamas Family Values
- Celebrating the Legendary Gene Hackman
- The Oscars, the Pope and the Woke, Oh My!
- What Trump can Learn from McKinley's Tariffs
- Land of the Artful Dodgers
- Alec Baldwin gets a Taste of his own Toxic ‘Comedy'
Blog Posts
- Climate change to cancel ice rinks in Minnesota?
- Just who was Zelensky talking to on the phone from his limo after he was thrown out of the White House?
- The reporting on Republicans hasn't changed much in more than forty years
- Zelensky’s path to political and military success: Insert foot in mouth, shoot foot – then pick a fight with Trump and Vance … in public
- Kash must pony up
- 29 cartel kingpins extradited to US in historic move
- Z-Man KOs himself
- Trump’s first cabinet meeting
- Murder in the White House
- Is Jeff Bezos seeing the light?
- A $1.1-billion mistake
- What DOGE can learn from the states
- Netflix propaganda flicks
- Patel and Bongino: will the FBI survive?
- Cartels are daring Trump to go ISIS on them