Yom Hashoa and the UN's View

Tonight and tomorrow is Yom Hashoa where in Israel and for Jews around the world, we will be remembering the martyrs of the Holocaust (this date was chosen by Israel to commemorate the start of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising).

However, on the same day the Iranian President who will be the keynote speaker at the UN's Human Rights Conference, publicly denies the existance of the Holocaust and has called for Israel to be wiped off the map.

I have recently written about how I am concerned about the rise in anti-Semitism that over the past five or so years has started to increase in Britain. However, this is not a phenomenon that is just occuring but which is increasing all over the world. In effect we are experiencing the worst period of anti-Semitim since the Holocaust.

Holocaust Days were introduced in order to highlight the result of hatred and racism, so as to never again allow a genocide to happen again. However, despite us having these days to reflect on the result of hatred and racism, we have still allowed genocides to happen in the former Yugoslavia, Rwuanda and currently in Darfur and Zimbabwe.

The United Nations was also established just over 60 years in order to stop hatred and racism, and in 2001 held a Human Rights, Anti-Racism Conference in Durban South Africa. However, rather than try and halt human rights abuses around the world, whether in the forms of sexism, racism or homophopia; the UN as its sole human rights objective, again began a battle with Israel by effectively defining it as a racist state. As a student at the time I immediately noticed an increase in the hatred of Israel and Jewish students at the time, to the result that on campuses around Britain, groups began to try and ban Jewish Societies in the same way as they did in the 1970s. Not only this, Jewish students were both verbally and physically abused.

I therefore believe that it was the UN's 2001 so called 'anti-racism' conference that has led to the worst anti-semitism occuring in the past 60 years.

This week the UN are again holding a Human Rights, Anti-Racism Conference. I hope unlike in 2001, the delegates actually choose to find a way to tackle racism, sexism and homophobia around the world. However, I am not confident and so I back the few countries such as Italy, the USA and Australia who have supported Israel in boycotting the Conference.

The reason I am not confident is because the UN have invited the Iranian President Ahmadinejad to be the key speaker. Mr Ahmadinejad has actively denied and supported others who deny the Holocaust occured and has called for Israel to be wiped off the map, at the same time as developing nuclear weapons. Given this fact and that Iran together with Libya have prepared the conference, I am concerned that the Arabic World and their supporters will again try and target Israel, which will further worsen the level of anti-Semitism around the world. If this does occur I hope Britain and other delegates will walk-out of the conference and show it for the farce that it is.

Only through actively showing that the world does not support anti-Semitism and the destruction of Israel, can the world help to defeat these evils.