International Human Rights Day 2012 - From Tragedy to Farce

Gerald M. Steinberg..
Times of Israel..
10 December '12..

2012 was another dismal year, and there is little to celebrate on International Human Rights Day. The carnage in Syria has destroyed more than 40,000 lives, and in Egypt, a new dictatorship has replaced the previous one. In Iran, last year’s democracy protesters are forgotten, and the Stalinist show trials designed to intimidate these advocates are ignored. On these and other cases of blatant human rights violations, the self-appointed moral guardians in the UN and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) respond with little more than lip service.

Tragically, Human Rights Day, which marks the anniversary of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Genocide Conventions, now serves as a reminder of the abject failure of organizations that claim to promote these principles. Ignoring the pleas of victims around the world, the UN Human Rights Council routinely exploits the rhetoric of international law as a weapon in the political war targeting Israel. The nation-state of the Jewish people is a convenient diversion from so many real abuses, which explains the obsessive “war crimes” claims, as illustrated again during the recent Gaza conflict.

To make matters worse, the human rights NGOs that were founded optimistically in order to promote universal moral behavior have become accomplices in promoting this immorality. The leaders of powerful groups like Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Oxfam, the Paris-based International Federation of Human Rights and others with multi-million-dollar budgets, work closely with and support the agendas of the UNHRC and other corrupt international frameworks.

Instead of speaking truth to this blatant abuse of power, officials of these wayward human rights groups are part of the problem. For the so-called “human rights community”, Iran’s supply of Fajr missiles to Hamas and Hezbollah, for use in targeting Israeli civilians, is not even on the agenda. And, as recently noted in the Wall St. Journal, Ken Roth, the head of Human Rights Watch and an obsessive anti-Israel ideologue, cannot bring himself to condemn the genocidal rhetoric of the Iranian regime.

Human Rights Day 2009 - little to celebrate

Gerald Steinberg
Opinion/JPost
09 December 09

December 10 is known as International Human Rights Day, marking the anniversary of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Genocide Conventions. But in 2009, as in past years, there is little to celebrate - this has been another bad year for human rights. In Darfur, the Congo and elsewhere in Africa, mass killings continue, with only minor and sporadic attention from the media or the United Nations.

In Iran, a rigged election brought thousands of democracy protestors into the streets, where they were beaten and arrested (70 demonstrators, including Neda Agha-Soltan, were reportedly killed), followed by Stalinist show-trials designed to intimidate these advocates. And in Asia, the tyrannical regimes in North Korea and Myanmar terrorize their citizens daily, with no end in sight.

This bleak record highlights the abject failure of the international community to live up to its moral commitments. The United Nations Human Rights Council pursues a cynical agenda that uses the rhetoric of international law as a weapon in the political war targeting Israel.

The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), China, Russia and other chronic human rights abusers, constitute a majority on the UNHRC and appoint its officials. They have no interest in opening a discussion of Tibet, Chechnya, or the systematic oppression of women or minorities in Saudi Arabia.

Israel is a convenient diversion, which explains the obsessive focus on claims of "war crimes" and "collective punishment," as well as the biased composition and activities of the Goldstone inquiry on the Gaza conflict.

(Full article)
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