The United Nations has been transformed into a battleground where Israel’s very legitimacy is under challenge the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations was told by Israel’s UN Ambassador, Yehuda Blum. In a report to the UN Task Force of the Presidents Conference, Blum said that parollelling the drive to “delegitimize Israel was a powerful effort to grant legitimacy and respect ability to the Palestine Liberation Organizations.
The PLO enjoys all the rights and privileges of UN membership except the responsibility of paying dues and the right to vote, which it does not need because it can count on some 90 to 100 automatic anti-Israel ballots in the General Assembly on any given issue, Blum said.
Yehuda Hellman, executive director at the Presidents Conference, said the organization’s UN Task Force would draw plans for mobilizing public support across the country to block efforts at the UN that would turn over UN Development Program funds directly to the PLO. Such a Presidents Conference effort would emphasize the principle that no UN funds should go to any organization whose purpose is to destroy a UN member state.
Blum, in his presentation, reported that the office of UN Secretary General Kurt Woldheim had published a two-volume document on the “History and Origin of the Palestinian Question,” which presented only the PLO position and “Utterly ignored” the facts presented by Israel in rebuttal to the draft report. The report, published by the Special Unit on the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, includes passages that repeat PLO propaganda word for word, Blum noted.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
