A Blow for Human Rights

The big secret about the United Nations Human Rights Council is that it does not care about human rights. Those who are bemoaning America’s exit from the council are so simple minded that they believe America is no longer interested in promoting human rights.

What is the UN Human Rights Council? It’s a cabal containing some of the world’s worst human rights abusers. It is mostly concerned with attacking Israel and, by proxy, the United States. If you believe that American should continue to be part of the council, you are countenancing an organization that promotes worldwide anti-Semitism.

Imagining that the UN HRC promotes or advances human rights is absurd to the point of being risible.

Yesterday, UN Ambassador Nikki Haley announced America’s withdrawal at the State Department, in the company of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. For those who care about symbolism and the like, the structure of the announcement showed that Haley was not a lone ranger: she was acting in accord with State Department policy.

Pompeo had a few choice words of his own:

Mr. Pompeo said the Council had a poor record of defending human rights and criticized it for allowing some of the world’s worst offenders, including Iran and Venezuela, to remain as members.

“The Council has failed in its stated objective,” Mr. Pompeo said, calling it an “exercise in shameless hypocrisy.”

And also:

On Tuesday, Mr. Pompeo used the same terms to criticize the U.N. body. “The Council’s continued and well documented bias against Israel is unconscionable,” he said.

As for Nikki Haley, she said:

Ms. Haley called it a “hypocritical and self-serving” organization that protects rights abusers, and a “cesspool of political bias.”

She continued:

Ms. Haley has spoken out frequently against the U.N. Human Rights Council and on Tuesday denounced what she called its “chronic bias against Israel.” Ms. Haley complained that the Council has issued more resolutions condemning Israel than North Korea, Iran and Syria combined.

The New York Times offered this in a news story:

It was the first time a member has voluntarily left the United Nations Human Rights Council. The United States now joins Iran, North Korea and Eritrea as the only countries that refuse to participate in the council’s meetings and deliberations.

Thereby it is suggesting that the United States is joining tyrants and despots in rejecting the noble cause of human rights. In truth, as the Times also noticed, the Trump administration is refusing to collude with and to legitimate an organization that systematically persecutes Israel, that holds it up to opprobrium for no reason other than pure bigotry.

One might say that the United States just struck a blow against the oldest of bigotries. Naturally, those who pretend to support human rights are appalled.