Orthodox Union Commends Obama Administration Announcement to Not Participate in Anti-Israel Parley at the U.N.

The Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, the nation’s largest orthodox umbrella organization today applauded the Obama Administration’s decision to not participate in the United Nations’ 2011 “Durban III” conference.

For over sixty years those who could not destroy Israel on the field of battle have sought to delegitimize her among the nations of the world. This campaign reached its ugly apex in the infamous United Nations resolution equating Zionism with racism and racial discrimination. While this ugly canard was finally repudiated in 1991, this campaign was reinvigorated at the 2001 UN Conference Against Racism in Durban. The United States chose to walk out of the subsequent 2009 meeting. The Administration’s decision not to attend this year’s conference is clear:

In a letter sent to Senator Kirsten Gillibrand from Assistant Secretary of State Joseph McManus wrote: “The United States will not participate in the Durban Commemoration. In December, we voted against the resolution establishing this event because the Durban process included ugly displays of intolerance and anti-Semitism, and we did not want to see that commemorated”

Nathan Diament, Director of Public Policy for the Orthodox Union stated:

“We commend the Obama Administration’s decision to not attend this conference. The Durban conference process is a spectacle intended to accuse Israel of violating universally accepted conventions and norms. Such attacks are then used as a basis for justifying international isolation, economic sanction, and the threatened prosecution of Israeli officials. We call on other U.N. member nations to follow the example of the United States.”