‘Entrenched Anti-Israeli Bias Has Been Laid Bare’: UNGA Passes Three Resolutions Targeting Israel

Latest Developments

• UNGA Demands Unconditional Israeli Withdrawal, Announces Conference to Promote Palestinian Statehood: The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) adopted on December 3 a resolution calling for Israel to unilaterally withdraw from the West Bank, Gaza, and eastern Jerusalem, mirroring maximalist Palestinian demands. The resolution also announces a conference in June 2025 designed to “urgently chart an irreversible pathway towards” a Palestinian state. In response to the three UNGA resolutions targeting Israel, Reut Shapir Ben-Naftaly, Israel’s UN political coordinator, called the measures a “reckless disregard for the truth” and declared that “the UN’s entrenched anti-Israeli bias has been laid bare for all to see.”

• UNGA Condemns Israeli Presence in the Golan Heights: At the same time as Sunni jihadist rebels are battling Iranian client Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria, the UNGA called on Israel to “desist from … its repressive measures against the population of the occupied Syrian Golan.” The United Nations estimates that the Syrian civil war has claimed the lives of over 300,000 civilians since it began in 2011. The annual resolution, which does not consider the fate civilians in the Golan would face under Assad, passed with 97 countries in favor, eight against, and 64 abstentions.

• UNGA Votes to Fund ‘Biased’ Division for Palestinian Rights: By a vote of 101 in favor, 27 against, and 42 abstentions, the UNGA voted to fund the division dedicated to promoting the Palestinian agenda. The division oversees the International Day of Solidarity With the Palestinian People, which has featured speakers at UN events calling for the elimination of Israel, and UNISPAL, a body dedicated to disseminating pro-Palestinian information. The watchdog organization UN Watch has called the division “biased,” noting that it is the only UN division devoted exclusively to one people.

FDD Expert Response

“These are instructive moments for UN reform efforts. We can rail all we want about the institutional antisemitism across the UN system, but we also need to be honest that the General Assembly is ultimately a sum of its parts. That is to say, individual states made a decision to support these resolutions. Look at how many supposed U.S. allies and partners either voted in favor or abstained. Look at how many of them are either recipients of U.S. foreign aid, NATO members, or other treaty or major non-NATO allies. Where is the accountability in capitals?” — Richard Goldberg, Senior Advisor

“The Division for Palestinian Rights is one of the clearest expressions of the UN’s anti-Israel bias. The United Nations maintains an entire infrastructure of bodies dedicated to holding Israel under a microscope and promoting Palestinian political goals. No other country is subject to such scrutiny. That it happens to be the world’s only Jewish state isn’t a curiosity. It’s antisemitism.”— David May, Research Manager and Senior Research Analyst

“Again, the UN General Assembly is behaving as though its defamatory 1975 resolution equating Zionism with racism, rescinded 16 years later, is still on the books. The incoming U.S. administration, which hardly regards the United Nations as a trusted organization, should declare that its aim is for these biased bodies like the Division for Palestinian Rights to be dismantled.” — Ben Cohen, FDD Senior Analyst and Rapid Response Manager