|
From The Herald Sun:
Jews Prove Easy Catch THEY say that you should set a thief to catch a thief.
Steve Howe October 26, 2009Â 12:00AM
The none-too-smart and ideologically unsound United Nations works on more simplistic levels - it sets angry Arabs to catch its Jews.
Works every time.
There's no shortage of angry, resentful and underachieving Arabs at the UN, nor will it run out of like-minded Africans too soon.
By and large, Arabs and Africans are not good at democracy. They don't do personal freedoms all that well. Many of them are fond of cruel and unusual punishments - you know, public stonings for miscreant young women wanting to marry the man of their choosing, that sort of thing.
That the UN powerlessly condemns such behaviour is, apparently, beside the point.
In a sneering perversion of logic, some Arab and African nations, to whom human rights are an unnecessary indulgence, sit at some of the UN's top tables - the UN Human Rights Council and even the Committee Against Torture.
Sharing leg space under the UN's influential desks are such legendary stalwarts of democratic fairness and equality as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Burkina Faso, Egypt, Cameroon, Madagascar, Jordan, Nigeria, Senegal and China. Tin pots, basket cases, thugs - take your pick.
They were just some of the countries that, as members of the Human Rights Council, initiated and sat on an inquiry into the Israeli actions in Gaza, which took place almost a year ago.
Led by esteemed South African jurist Richard Goldstone, they lived up to cheeky Oscar Wilde's putdown of Britain's then greatest poet, William Wordsworth. Wilde said of Wordsworth's famous bucolic lessons that "he found in stones lessons he had already put there".
The UN Human Rights Council had its finding sewn up in January when it sent "an independent ... fact-finding mission" to the "occupied Gaza Strip".
OCCUPIED by whom? The Israelis walked away from Gaza four years ago, courageously dismantling the settlements there and controversially forcing its grumpy civilians to leave.
The only Israeli in Gaza that I can think of is the kidnapped soldier, Gilad Shalit, who has been held by Hamas terrorists for more than three years. Now there's someone Goldstone might have spoken to.
Gazans paid Israelis back in spades for the long-sought opportunity to be masters of their own fate: they sent thousands of Qasam rockets over the border and on to local towns, the deadly fusillade becoming a political imperative in democratic Israel.
Israelis wanted their Government to stop the shelling and end the terror. That's why the Israeli army entered Gaza last December in a controversial invasion in which about 1400 people were killed, mostly Palestinians. That's the thing when you take on the Israelis; they don't come at you with some wobbly rockets that Uncle Ali knocked up out the back last night.
And if you are going to employ the terrorist tactics of hiding and operating in densely populated areas and schools, expect some painful collateral damage.
The UNHRC didn't appear to be on a hunt for the truth - that often being unbearable - but they are keen to reinforce the prejudices of each other by condemning Israel. Its predecessor, the UN Human Rights Commission, did the same until, thoroughly discredited, it embarrassed even Secretary-General Kofi Annan and he shut it down.
So with a slight change of name - the acronym stays the same, saves on stationery - it's back to the same unquenchable hatred for Israel.
Goldstone's report predictably accused Israel of human rights abuses in Gaza - so self-defence is now a crime?
A RESOLUTION endorsing the report's finding went further, upsetting its author. It contained "not a single phrase condemning Hamas as we have done in the report", said Goldstone, sounding almost surprised.
So which fearless, peace-loving and virtuous states signed on?
Senegal, for a start. Kids are big business in Senegal, but not the Toys 'R' Us kind. There they are sold into forced labor, prostituted and often trafficked to other countries to become domestic servants - the illegal variety that has almost no identity and whom you can imprison and rape with impunity.
This year Senegal arrested nine HIV-prevention workers, reportedly beat them, accused them of consorting with criminals (being in police custody in Dakar, I guess they were), charged them with "indecent and unnatural acts" and jailed them.
Senegal - and I wish this were a joke - is also a key player on the UN's Committee Against Torture.
Egypt also saw merit in the loony resolution. Now here's a country that keeps the Committee Against Torture busy. The committee has expressed concern at the "persistence of the phenomenon of torture and ill-treatment of detainees by law enforcement officials".
In 2002, the very committee on which now Egypt sits found it guilty of a pattern of "torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment".
Nigeria voted yes. I'm voting Nigeria's one of the nastiest governments on earth. Prisoners of its corrupt judicial system are raped and tortured. The lucky ones.
In Nigeria's northern states, lashings and stonings are popular and, if you see an amputee in the streets, it is unlikely that he is a member of the Limbless Soldiers' Association. Of course, there are restrictions on freedoms of speech, movement, assembly, religion and the press.
Djibouti voted yes, but I wonder what the genitally mutilated, repressed women of that Horn of Africa hellhole really think?
Cameroon voted yes, and if you are up for a few entertaining minutes just look at official travel advisory for it.
While you are there you might check advisories for Zambia, Pakistan, Ghana, the Philippines, Russia, Richard Goldstone's homeland South Africa, Qatar, Mauritius and all the others who sit in judgment on a world gone mad.
Â
|