Professor Anne Bayefsky, Director of the Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust and President of Human Rights Voices, spoke to Arutz Sheva - Israel National News about the expected discussion in the United Nations Security Council today on the issue of the hostages who were kidnapped by the Hamas terrorist organization on October 7, 2023, the first official meeting the body has held on the issue in the eleven months since the mass kidnapping.
"The UN Security Council has officially met 46 times on the subject of the Palestinian Arab-Israeli conflict since October 7, 2023 and held at least another eight closed informal consultations on the same subject. In that time, it has issued four resolutions on the conflict. Not a single one of those resolutions condemns Hamas for its October 7th atrocities - or for anything at all. None of those resolutions even condemn the terror attack of October 7th," Professor Bayefsky said.
"There are other forms of possible Security Council actions, such as presidential statements that are made by whichever country holds the presidency on behalf of all its members. The Security Council issued zero presidential statements on the October 7 atrocities and direct threat to international peace and security," she said.
"The Security Council has issued two less formal 'press statements' on the conflict since October 7. A press statement is issued upon the agreement of all members of the Council. Neither of those statements condemn Hamas for the October 7 attack, or for anything at all," Prof. Bayefsky said.
"In stark contrast, making the double-standards, discrimination and grotesque UN bias against Israel even more obvious are the following statistics." She noted, "Since October 7, the Security Council has adopted eight resolutions condemning terror attacks: in Somalia, Afghanistan, Yemen, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and has specifically condemned the Houthis (for attacking boats, not Israelis) and Al-Shabaab."
"The Security Council has also issued nine press statements condemning terrorism and terror attacks in specific countries (Burkina Faso, Iran, Pakistan, and Russia), and they have included specific condemnations of terror groups as such, one Al-Qaida-affiliated and the other in Pakistan," she pointed out.
"Seventy-percent of all the press statements on terrorism from the Security Council since October 7 were issued within 24 hours of the terror attack. But 333 days since October 7, the Security Council still has not issued any condemnation of the terror attack on Israel. (Nor has the Security Council condemned any of the other multiple terror attacks perpetrated by Palestinians against Israelis in Israel and the West Bank/Judea and Samaria in the last 11 months.)," she further pointed out.
She noted, "One of the Security Council press statements on a terror attack in Pakistan specifically highlighted that 5 of the 6 people killed were Chinese nationals. By contrast, on October 7, Hamas murdered 69 citizens of over 30 UN member states - but has totally escaped any Security Council condemnation."
She stated that, "It has already been three days since the world learned of Hamas's execution of six Israeli hostages, kidnapped, tortured for eleven months and finally murdered."
"Since that discovery by the IDF - operating themselves under life-threatening conditions in Gaza - what has the UN done?" she asked. "UN Secretary-General António Guterres obscenely refused to name and condemn Hamas. Instead, he lumped together the hostages' execution with Israeli attempts to rescue the hostages and defend the state from an enemy committed to taking more."
"The UN's top human rights official, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, called into question the identity of the perpetrators, refusing to name Hamas or any Palestinian as a terrorist. In the tradition of Holocaust-deniers, Türk referred to the executions as merely 'reports'. His comments mirror how multiple UN actors (particularly his predecessor Navi Pillay) refer to Hamas's systematic sexual atrocities and rape of Israelis as 'reports' that have not been verified," she said.
She added, "The UN's lead human rights "investigator" or special rapporteur on Israel, Francesca Albanese, issued a press release while the dead were being buried in Israel. She accused Israel of crimes against humanity and taking 12,000 Palestinians as 'hostages' (a title she applies, for instance, to convicted murderers in Israeli prisons)."
"Since the bodies were discovered with a shot to the back of the head, Hamas has variously claimed that they were killed by an Israeli airforce strike, shot by IDF soldiers, or their killing by Hamas was required to prevent their rescue. In another absurdity, Hamas has said that it is conducting an investigation into the deaths. UN Human Rights Commissioner Türk has also said the 'reports' need 'investigation.' And the UN's Albanese has wondered whether 'they were executed or killed,'" she said.
According to Prof. Bayefsky, "In other words, the Hamas playbook bears remarkable similarities to the host of despicable UN diversionary tactics."
"One might be forgiven for some skepticism at the prospect of the United Nations Security Council finally condemning Hamas and recognizing this genocidal organization and its cold-blooded executioners as terrorists," Prof. Bayefsky concluded.
