Great article Vic, thanks very much. Couldn't agree more. The organisation that goes under the name of the United Nations Human Rights Council is pure travesty. The preoccupation with Israel shows the council's real agenda. Your story is a story I have read many times before, but as long as things don't change and people believe in a preposterous institution like this council, the story can't be repeated enough.

Sadly the problem is not confined to human rights bodies at the UN. To judge from the reports put out on everything from immigration and agriculture through to energy and climate, the various sub-bodies of the UN have evolved into organisations dedicated to pushing social agendas. Their job is not to report on the problems but to propagandise about how bad they are. There are some who do excellent work - sections of the World Health Organsiation, for example, may be of some use, but only sections. If anyone can think of exceptions then please post..

I think the UN is a useful organisation since it includes almost all nations and has done some good with its peacekeeping forces, Unesco and other activities.

However, the UN is a failure in human rights. The inordinate emphasis on Israel is clearly unreasonable, and, I believe, largely motivated by Jew hatred. Many nations which have subscribed to the UN convention of human rights have no interest in furthering those rights.

If those nations which have a commitment to human rights are genuinely interested in furthering those rights wherever they are violated and regardless of the identity of the violaters and violated they could form a new organisation devoted solely to the promotion of human rights. Only nations which have demonstrated such a commitment should be allowed membership.

Of the much ignorant commentary that has been written about UN human rights debates, this piece wins the prize for the most monumental ignorance. The author wrongly condemns supposed membership on the UN Human Rights Council by Iran, Sudan, Zimbabwe, China and North Korea. Iran twice ran for Council membership and was DEFEATED in 2006, and forced to withdraw in 2010. Sudan, Zimbabwe and North Korea have NEVER been members of the Council. China alas is a member, but as one of the world's great powers must be reckoned with. The misinformed author goes on to say Libya was Council Chair, again FALSE. Libya was NEVER Chair, and while briefly a member, was suspended form the Council by unanimous vote of the UN General Assembly after suppressing peaceful protesters in 2011.

It's all downhill from there. Darfur, Syria, Iran and other situations have indeed been condemned by the Council. China, Zimbabwe and indeed all other states are subject to sharp criticism in the Council's universal periodic review process.

The author is apparently a passionate supporter of Israel who would seek to delegitimize the Council to shield Israel from any scrutiny. Certainly the current inquiry into the illegal Israeli settlements on lands occupied since 1967 is a legitimate human rights process. The Council may have criticized Israel disproportionately in the past, but this inquiry is reasonable, and throwing around grotesque falsehoods as this author does is no way to protect Israel.

rightswatcher:

...First post, and I wonder, will we hear from you again under this disguise?

It's a pity those world trade centre bombers weren't a bit worse with their navigation.

If they had flown into the UN building, instead of the Trade centre buildings, they would have done the world a favour.

Diver Dan

As it is a first post, perhaps we should do rightswatcher the courtesy of engaging their argument, without leaping straight to the ad hominems?

As to their argument …

rightswatcher
Wasn’t Libyan Najat Al-Hajjaji elected chair of UN Commission on Human Rights 59th session?

The United Nations being anti semitic? No wonder the Greens love them and would like them to govern the world.

Israel murders with impunity and still jews don't shut up their whinging.

The murderer in this case is dead, what on earth is the point of having a resolution to condemn him?

Hasbeen, that is depraved.

The UN human rights council is based in Geneva, what would murdering innocent men, women and children in the UN security council building in New York have done to stop that?

Is the UN human rights council in the habit of denouncing every murder and attrocity commited in the world? Do they make a statement every time drug lords commit massacres in Mexico? Or is it simply that Jewish lives are so much more valuable than everyone else's? I would have thought their business was to comment on the actions of states, not of common criminals.

Rhian:

...Lets not confuse “Jugular” with “ad hominems”

Big central banks create all the money for the USA and Europe to function.They control our Govts and hence the UN.Their long term agenda is World Govt in which we won't have a vote.

Rhian, a Libyan did indeed serve (credibly, as it happens) as chair of the former UN commission a decade ago, but as even the Orwellian author is aware, that body was replaced by the new Human Rights Council in 2006. The Council replaced former principles of sovereign equality that governed the former Commission -- any UN member may serve -- with aspirational membership standards that has made it possible to discourage or successfully oppose many violator states from getting elected to the Council. Membership is far from perfect, but it reflects a better-than-average sample of the world at large and permits a more constructive dialogue on human rights. There are of course NO perfect countries in the world.

Diver Dan, correct, I'm not Australian, but joined when a google search showed me this particularly ignorant and biased article. Yes, there has been an overabundance of criticisms of Israel, but the inquiry into the settlements has overwhelming global support. Of the 47 members of the Human Rights Council, only one, the U.S., opposed the resolution establishing this inquiry, likely for domestic political reasons.

It is one of the really fun aspects of this forum - and bar-room arguments, come to that - is that we can all look at the same situation and draw diametrically opposite conclusions.

Take Arjay's offering as a prime example.

>>Big central banks create all the money for the USA and Europe to function.They control our Govts and hence the UN.<<

I would have thought that the recent experience of Greece would have put that little misunderstanding to bed. Who was it that had to take a massive cut in their loan portfolio? Ummm, it was the Banks who were dumb enough to lend to the Greek government.

Who was "in control"? Was it the Greek government, who unilaterally decided that they would cut up their loan agreements, and pay back half of what they contained? Or was it the Banks, who had to walk away with less than half of what they were owed?

If lending money to governments is a form of control over them, then it is certain that nobody told those Bankers. The fact was, the threat of default - the government's ultimate form of control - scared them silly. They could have lost the lot.

>>Their long term agenda is World Govt in which we won't have a vote<<

Lending money to governments is, I would suggest, not the most convincing basis for a takeover programme.

We should be very, very wary of allowing any more power/influence to accrue to the UN. In a time when “human rights” is the rally cry and flavor of the month, it is all too easy to see our liberal Western democracies as brothers-in-arms with the UN striving for common standards-- a “better world”. But we need to bear in mind that there are a raft of other causes where the West is pigeon-holed as the arch-villain. And most of our OZ-side “progressives” seem sycophantically committed to such causes –and “world government”.

Far fetched? Anyone who listened to Ban Ki-Moon's speech during his recent visit to the University of Sydney will have seen just how willing the UN is to use the most extreme of climate-change alarmism. And anyone who has read some our most prominent AGW spruikers here on OLO will have seen just how willing they are to sit tamely on the UN's shoulder and screech “Aye aye capt’n …Polly wants a cracker” to anything the UN (or IPCC) gives its imprimatur to.

So before you join the chorus calling for the UN “to do something”, anywhere –give it a lot of thought. What can be used against Syria today can used against Australia tomorrow.

Owellian refers to more than the inversion of reality and manipulation of the truth. It also refers to the oppression of all except a tiny elite and suppression of the voices of all dissidents who stray from the permitted and carefully contrived message. In Orwell's dystopia woe betide all who tilt at shibboleths.
The losers in the real world are actually all those discriminated against and those who are deprived of their heritage, their identity, their rights, their homes and their lands. Everywhere.
But paradoxically, history also shows us that those who imagine themselves to be the winners, i.e. those who steal someone else's heritage, homes,land,identity and rights, and see their winning as attained by winning over their victims,usually end up as losers as well.
Empires and dictators do not win forever!
This is obviously a lesson that some refuse to learn. And it is to do with the refusal to learn that lesson that the "Arab Spring" is all about.
And despite the attempts to rewrite history- remember Vietnam? remember the MV Mavi Marmara?- bullies would do well to recall that "1984" is a fiction. In the real world there will always be those who will refuse to submit and who will refuse to obey their Big Brother.
And the UN is not Big Brother. Despite the attempts by bullying states to subvert and corrupt its ideals and principles it is the best thing we have to challenge those whose ambitions include world domination and elimination of all those who dont obey.
Everyone is entitled to choose their own team. But those who choose the side of war criminals and those who commit crimes against humanity had better beware.
The ICC one day, I hope will see some familiar faces in the dock.
International fora, despite the attempts to subvert their ideals by Big Brother states,are a necessary force in our world today