Australia takes a stand against anti-Israel bias
'The Australian government is to be highly commended for consistently voting against these resolutions, and for exposing the bias and puncturing the hypocrisy which motivates them'
COMMUNAL leaders have lauded the Australian government’s stance at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), after it was the only country to vote against all five anti-Israel resolutions at UNHRC’s 43rd session.
The UNHRC, which has a history of systemic bias against the Jewish State, passed five resolutions against Israel, leading the Australian Mission to the United Nations to blast its “disproportionate focus”.
“Australia has been consistent in its principled opposition to biased and one-sided resolutions targeting Israel in multilateral forums,” the mission said.
Stating, “Our position has not changed,” it added the resolutions “do nothing to contribute to lasting peace and stability for Israelis and Palestinians”.
Meanwhile, Australia’s ambassador to the UN Sally Mansfield said the UNHRC “holds Israel to a higher degree of scrutiny than any other state”.
Noting that Australia has “insisted on bringing these resolutions to a vote, so that they cannot simply be waved though as consensus resolutions”, Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-CEO Peter Wertheim said, “The Australian government is to be highly commended for consistently voting against these resolutions, and for exposing the bias and puncturing the hypocrisy which motivates them.”
Zionist Federation of Australia president Jeremy Leibler said the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister had refused to “kowtow to the UN’s obsessive focus on Israel”.
“The votes in Geneva have proven once again that the Prime Minister was deserving of the Jerusalem Prize, which I gave him last November, due to his strong leadership on Israel in the UN and elsewhere,” Leibler said.
Praising Australia for its “consistent moral courage”, Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council executive director Colin Rubenstein said the UNHRC’s anti-Israel bias “undermined … its intended mission of holding genuine human rights abusers to account.”
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