The United States has announced it will oppose a United Nations General Assembly committee resolution condemning Israel’s presence in the Golan Heights and calling on the Netanyahu government to return the region — which was annexed decades ago by Israel — to Syria.
In past years, the United States has abstained on the vote on the annual UN resolution entitled “The Occupied Syrian Golan,” scheduled for later today (Friday, November 16).
However, “given the resolution’s anti-Israel bias, as well as the militarization of the Syrian Golan border and a worsening humanitarian crisis, this year the United States has decided to vote “No” on the resolution,” the announcement said.
“The United States will no longer abstain when the United Nations engages in its useless annual vote on the Golan Heights. If this resolution ever made sense, it surely does not today,” Ambassador Nikki Haley said in a statement.
“The resolution is plainly biased against Israel. Further, the atrocities the Syrian regime continues to commit prove its lack of fitness to govern anyone. The destructive influence of the Iranian regime inside Syria presents major threats to international security.
“ISIS and other terrorist groups remain in Syria. And this resolution does nothing to bring any parties closer to a peace agreement. The United States will vote no,” said Ambassador Haley.
Israel’s Ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, welcomed the American vote against the UN resolution condemning Israel’s presence in the Golan Heights.
“The change in the American voting pattern is another testament to the strong cooperation between the two countries,” Danon said.
“I thank Ambassador Haley for her continued steadfastness with Israel and the truth. It is time for the world to distinguish between those who stabilize the region and those who sow terror.”
In fact, the UN General Assembly Special Political and Decolonization Committee — known as the Fourth Committee — is set to adopt nine resolutions on Friday against Israel, zero against any other nation. All 193 UN member states belong to the committee.
“After the Syrian regime has killed half a million of its own people, how can the UN call for more people to be handed over to Assad’s rule? The text is morally galling, and logically absurd.”
UN Watch applauded U.S. Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley for announcing Thursday that the United States will vote “No” on the Assad-backed Golan resolution, instead of abstaining as has been done in the past. More than 3,000 Palestinian Arabs in Syria have been slaughtered, maimed and expelled by the forces of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad since 2011.
The texts condemn Israel for “repressive measures” against Syrian citizens in the Golan Heights, reinforce the mandate of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), and renew the mandate of the UN’s “special committee to investigate Israeli practices affecting the human rights of the Palestinian people and other Arabs of the Occupied Territories.”
“Days after the Hamas terrorist group assaulted Israeli civilians with a barrage of 460 rockets — while the UN’s General Assembly and Human Rights Council stayed silent — the world body now adds insult to injury by adopting nine lopsided condemnations, whose only purpose is to demonize the Jewish state,” pointed out UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer.
France, Germany, Sweden and other European Union states each year support 15 out of a total of 20 resolutions adopted against Israel, Neuer noted. But those same European nations “failed to introduce a single UNGA resolution this year on the human rights situation in China, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, Belarus, Cuba, Turkey, Pakistan, Vietnam, Algeria, or on 175 other countries.”