BoycottDurban2

I have taken the unusual step of using my blog to demonstrate against Durban 2. This conference, like its predecessor, the first Durban Conference, is being used as a means to demonize Israel as if it were a Nazi state.

I sometimes work as an academic and have been trained to discover facts via research, evaluate them forensically and arrive at an objective conclusion. The people making these false claims against Israel simply hate that country and all it represents and, as a consequence are not doing any of this. They are slaves of age old prejudices that dictate their agenda and no facts are allowed in to shed light.

I also work as a journalist and as such was taught that, with any story you should triangulate your facts. In other words if three, separate, legitimate and distinct sources tell you the same thing the likelihood is that there is truth in the story. The claim that Israel is a racist, apartheid state cannot be substantiated using this method. Like any country Israel has faults. But it is not a fault to have an identity, which it wishes to protect. If this is a sin then all the Arab countries, the UK and many others are all guilty of exactly the same thing. Israel wishes to be a Jewish state, just as Saudi Arabia wants to be Islamic, just as the UK is a Church of England country. This doesn’t mean there are not non-Christians in the UK.

Accusations such as the non-Jews are not allowed in the Israeli Defense Forces are not true. There are many non-Jews in these forces. Very few of them are Muslim however, and that is for reasons of national security. How many people of German or Japanese heritage were allowed in the British or American forces during the Second World War? The answer is very few, and the reasons are identical.

Arab Israelis do have the vote and do have members in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament. There is now a member of Israel’s ruling government who is an Arab Muslim.

Below is a call for the boycott of Durban 2 that is self explanatory and which we hope you find interesting and thought provoking.

PETITION: "BOYCOTT DURBAN 2!"
By Nasrin Amirsedghi,Thomas von der Osten-Sacken,Alex Feuerherdt
First Published July 29, 2008

Nearly seven years ago, the, UN World Conference against Racism met in Durban South Africa. The official aim of the event was the public recognition of slavery and colonialism as crimes. However, the conference mutated into an upright tribunal against Israel and its right to exist as well as defense for unfree states and dictators. Now, the United Nations plans a Durban Review Conference to take place in April 2009. A group of intellectuals urges European governments to call off their participation in this event/conference.

Recently, French novelist and essayist, Pascal Bruckner has already called to boycott the Durban Review Conference. “Anti-Semitism has become an ideology of the totalitarian movements in the UN, which they use for their own goals”, Bruckner explains his appeal. “Dictators and notorious semi-dictators abuse democratic language and instrumentalize legal standards, bringing them against democracies, without ever questioning themselves. Bruckner says that a “new inquisition” has emerged, using the term “religious slander to oppress any expression of doubt, especially in Muslim countries.” The Antiracism defended by the despots serves “to justify the very same things against which it was originally devised: oppression, prejudice and inequality”.

More than 30 journalists, authors, scientists and artists, In Europe, the United States and the Middle East have joined Bruckner’s petition, among them: Lars Gustafsson, Jeffrey Herf, Benny Morris, Peter Schneider, Seyran Ates, Necla Kelek and Ralph Giordano. They call the European Union member states, and especially Germany, to boycott the “Durban 2” Conference and to push forward a comprehensive reform of the UN Human Rights Commission.

For the initiators and supporters of the petition, the aim is democratization, secularization and universal protection of human rights against the pretended cultural-pluralism, which boils down to defending Islamic Shari’a against individual freedom. The Durban follow-up conference is diametrically opposed to this goal. Additionally, there is a fear of a renewed demonization of Israel, which democrats must confront determinedly. Anti-Semitism goes hand and hand with the support for dictatorships, such as in Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Instead of supporting the “Durban 2” conference, it is time to return to the spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Therefore, we call for a deep reform of the UN Human Rights Commission, which becomes more and more a forum for diffusion of Anti-Semitism, misogyny and unfreedom.

The initiators and supporters of the appeal hope that it will receive wide support. The petition will be delivered to the German government and to the governments of other EU countries on February 15th, 2009 and needs as many signatures as possible by this date.

The Petition and Instructions to sign, in English and German can be found at: http://boycottdurban2.wordpress.com

Everyone who wants to sign the appeal is sincerely invited. Please send an e-mail with your full name, your profession and your town to boycottdurban2@yahoo.de

Afterwards your signature will be published on the website of the Petition.

The appeal will result in an open letter to the German government and further governments of the EU before the start of the Durban Review Conference. This collection of signatures will therefore be closed by February 1st, 2009.

• Your E-mail-address will not appear on the website and will not be abused for commercial purposes.