October 16, 2021 | The Hill

US rejoining UN Human Rights Council; what it should do first

Richard Goldberg

Senior Advisor
Orde Kittrie

Senior Fellow
October 16, 2021 | The Hill

US rejoining UN Human Rights Council; what it should do first

Richard Goldberg

Senior Advisor
Orde Kittrie

Senior Fellow

Excerpt

The United States on Thursday won a seat on the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) beginning in January 2022, with the Biden administration vowing to prove it can reform the council from within. Biden’s first test: dissolving the council’s one-sided commission of inquiry on Israel.

In a statement issued moments after the UNHRC election results were announced, Secretary of State Antony Blinken put anti-Israel bias at the top of the Biden administration’s reform agenda. The council, he said, “suffers from serious flaws, including disproportionate attention on Israel and the membership of several states with egregious human rights records.”

Indeed, the council’s obsession with castigating Israel has long been atop the list of criticisms leveled against it. Since the council’s creation, it has adopted more resolutions condemning Israel than every other country in the world combined. In contrast, the council has adopted zero resolutions on the gross human rights abuses in China, Cuba, and Russia.

Richard Goldberg is a senior advisor at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (@FDD), a Washington-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy. Goldberg previously served as Director for Countering Iranian Weapons of Mass Destruction for the National Security Council. Follow him on Twitter @rich_goldberg. Orde Kittrie is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, law professor at Arizona State University, and author of Lawfare: Law as a Weapon of War. Follow him on Twitter @Ordefk.

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International Organizations Israel