The United Nations Commission on Human Rights today voted to postpone until next year a decision on a resolution embodying basic principles for eliminating the discrimination in education. The resolution was presented by the Subcommission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of minorities. The Israel representative was the only member of the commission to abstain.
At the same time, the Commission adopted by a vote of 17, none against, and one abstention (Israel), a resolution proposed by France stating that the Commission was in favor of drafting the basic principles of the eradication of discrimination in education but only after receiving further comments from governments.
The debate on the subject showed that the main question on which the Commission failed to reach agreement was on a definition of discrimination. Most delegations favored employing the criterion of intent to discriminate, while others, particularly the United States, felt that action which resulted in discrimination, even if it were unintentional, should be included.
During today’s discussion, Israel’s delegate Haim Cohen who is the Attorney General of Israel, objected to the American definition of discrimination. He noted that certain separate facilities in education did not in fact and should not in law constitute discrimination. As examples, he cited the separate school systems in Israel for Arabs and for ultra-Orthodox sects like Neturei Karta, who wanted their own school systems and were allowed by the Israel Government to have them. The British and French delegates supported the Israeli position.
Dr. Isaac Lewin, representative of the Agudas Israel World Organization to the Human Rights Commission, was interrupted by the Soviet delegate when he pointed out that Jordan, in preventing Jews from going to the Wailing Wall was practicing a form of religious discrimination.
The Russian, A.A. Fomin, was upheld by the chairman R. S. S. Gunewardene of Ceylcn who cautioned Dr. Lewin not to make critical references to specific countries. The exchange was touched off when the Agudas Israel representative stressed the right of everyone to have access to great religious shrines, and cited the Jordanian ban as a violation of this Right. Mr. Fomin then interrupted to charge that a particular country was being attacked.
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