Statement by Anne Bayefsky at the U.N. Human Rights Council debate on Durban, March 19, 2021

"The Durban Declaration encourages the hatred of Jews. Everyone who was there at its creation (as I was) knows that. Antisemites manufacture tools to spread intolerance by manipulating current events, appropriating the history of others, inverting right and wrong. Durban is such a tool. It perversely claims equality for some can be built on the inequality of the Jewish few – and specifically on the lethal lie that Palestinians are victims of Israeli racism. Actually, it is Palestinian Arabs who reject peaceful cohabitation with Jews, clamor for an ‘apartheid Palestine,’ and foment genocide against Jews in word and in deed. Durban I, and Durban II and III commemorations, were all celebrated by notorious antisemites, like Iran’s Ahmadinejad, because of the Durban lie. So here we are again. Durban IV. Germany with its history of antisemitic horrors, France and its appeasement of Jew hatred, Britain which recently harbored antisemitism in its political heartland, the United States, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands, Czech Republic, Austria, Poland…now all face a choice of the UN’s making. Durban IV is one more attempt to turn the fight against racism into a fight against Jews. It needs to be shunned. Not celebrated or commemorated. Not fully implemented or reaffirmed. To combat racism: stay away."