Out of UNGA ideas? So protest!

Rallies and protests are an important vehicle for articulating communal solidarity, and sometimes -- as with the Soviet Jewry movement -- for effecting real change. I have been to many Jewish and pro-Israel rallies, even organized a few, and I expect to do many more. Given next month's line-up, however, I don't see myself grabbing the bull horn.

I believe the annual Jewish protests across from the UN, opposing Iran's nuclear program, probably impact no UN votes. But as a community member, I have no problem following the consensus of my colleagues and fellow Jews, participating as one voice in solidarity. We have a duty to speak out, and that goes for other causes like Gilad Shalit, too.

So where am I drawing the line this Jewish holiday protest season?

Better late than never for U.S. on rights council (originally published May 17, 2009)

Durban II has concluded and nearly everyone has gone home. Next month, however, brings an event far more significant and substantive than any racism review document or yet another outrageous speech by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: The United States will formally join the United Nations Human Rights Council.


Unlike the one-shot Durban Review Conference known as Durban II, the Human Rights Council meets several times a year in Geneva in regular session, and includes special sessions (usually to condemn Israel) and the ongoing multi-year review of every country’s human rights record. Its first three years, without benefit of U.S. membership, have been no picnic. The council emerged from the detritus of the former Human Rights Commission, which had earned its reputation as a shamelessly ineffective institution obsessively focused on condemning Israel.


U.S. membership on the council comes none too soon. Canada, the first nation to announce it would boycott Durban II, will soon rotate off as a member of the council. The European Union members on the council are generally well meaning, which is part of the problem. Negotiating a compromise resolution sounds worthwhile, but toning down a blatantly one-sided and unfair anti-Israel resolution to the point where it is only implicitly one-sided does no favors for Israel or the credibility of universal human rights. It only allows European governments to avoid voting “no” on what is objectively an anti-Israel resolution.


Read full op-ed at JTA.org.

New administration brings chance to redeem U.N. (originally published Feb. 18, 2009)

In allowing U.S. representatives to attend consultations this week in Geneva, in a serious attempt to detoxify the Durban Review Conference in April, President Obama has taken one of his first concrete steps to show the world that the United States is not afraid to engage and on our own terms.


Rather than immediately recasting the confrontational image perceived by so many during most of the Bush years, the new administration may take advantage of the lingering resentment and apprehension as well as Barack Obama's credibility as an agent of progress and change.


The world and the United Nations have been optimistically curious about Obama's internationalist agenda and his new team. As those preparing the new U.S. strategy know well, "new politics" has not overtaken the United Nations or many of the regimes represented at its headquarters in New York and Geneva. The U.N.'s notoriously cynical human rights agenda is no exception.


By exacting a price for joining the Durban process and other high-profile human rights mechanisms, and possibly even giving a second chance to the International Criminal Court, the post-Bush United States might be able to strike a better deal if it does so before the diplomatic swords are turned into ploughshares. The American Jewish community should be a natural advocate for this approach.


Read full op-ed at JTA.org.

Obama at the UN: International Operators Are Standing By (originally posted November 10, 2008)

On January 20, rather than immediately retracting the confrontational image perceived by so many during most of the Bush years, the new Administration may take advantage of the unpleasant status quo and of Barack Obama’s credibility as an agent of progress.

As the Obama-Biden transition team takes over its temporary office space across from the White House, the world and the United Nations are optimistically curious about the internationalist agenda of the next U.S. President. As those preparing the new U.S. strategy know well, “new politics” has not overtaken the UN or many of the regimes represented at UN headquarters in New York and Geneva.

Perhaps the United States should be engaged in the Human Rights Council, or even the pre-flawed Durban anti-racism Review Conference scheduled for April 2009, or challenging Russia and China to admit their own national interest that ’s release of U.S. hostages on the day of his inauguration, one more opportunity for Ayatollah Khomeini to punish Jimmy Carter, but it was clearly a good thing for the United States.

By exacting a price for joining the high-profile human rights mechanisms, and possibly even giving a second chance to the International Criminal Court, the post-Bush United States might be able to strike a better deal if it does so before the diplomatic swords are turned into ploughshares.“sticking it” to George W. Bush is no longer on the menu. Ronald Reagan was not directly responsible for Iran