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| Hillel Neuer |
Jihad Watch : Of all the various U.N. bodies, the most anti-Israel and most
antisemitic of all – and the competition is stiff, with many strong
contenders – is the U.N. Human Rights Council. It is that body which has
an Item #7 on its permanent agenda, which requires it at every session
to investigate and prepare reports on so-called “violations” of
Palestinian human rights by Israel. The UNHRC has passed almost as many
resolutions denouncing Israel as it has passed against the other 193
members of the U.N. But it could have been worse.
After all, in 2020 the
UN General Assembly did itself proud by passing 17 resolutions against
the tiny Jewish state and only 6 against all the other 193 countries
combined. Among the current UNHRC members passing judgment on Israel are
such stalwart supporters of human rights as China, Cuba, Russia,
Bolivia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Libya, and Venezuela. The current
president of the UNHRC is Nazhat Shameem Khan of Pakistan. Need I say
more?
The other day, Hillel Neuer of the indispensable NGO UN Watch tried
to give a video presentation before the UNHCR about what some UNRWA
teachers are posting on their Facebook pages. He had all of 28 seconds
to speak before Nazhat Shameem Khan had the Council’s Secretariat shut
his video down.
Here is exactly what Khan and Neuer said:
Khan: Thank you. And I now give the floor to Ingenieurs du Monde [UN Watch]
Neuer: Madame President, is UNRWA supporting peace? Let us consider
UN Watch’s recent report on the teachers they hire by looking at their
social media.
Nahed Sharawi, an UNRWA math teacher in Gaza,
posted a picture of Adolf Hitler, along with “quotes to enrich and
enlighten your thoughts and minds.”
Husni Mash, an UNRWA teacher in the West Ban, posted
antisemitic conspiracy theories about how Jews control the world,
created the Covid virus, and seek to destroy Islam.
Esraa Abdul Rahim, an UNRWA…”
Khan: I ask the Secretariat to pause [i.e., to shut down] this video.
I have noticed that in the course of this video
derogatory, insulting, and inflammatory remarks have been made which in
particular refer directly to specific individuals. This amounts to
personal attack against these individuals and it is not acceptable in
this forum.
This statement is out of order, and I give the floor to the next speaker, the Palestine Return Centre, Limited.
I assume that Neuer identified his group as “Ingenieurs du Monde” so
that he might have the possibility of addressing the UNHCR, which would
likely not have happened had he identified himself as being with the NGO
UN Watch.
Neuer spoke for exactly 28 seconds – 28 seconds of truth out of
thousands of hours, year after year, of anti-Israel lies at the UNHCR.
He managed to name, and to describe, the disturbing Facebook pages of
two UNRWA teachers. The first was Nahed Sharawi, a math teacher in Gaza,
who posted a photograph of Adolf Hitler on his Facebook page and
offered “quotes to enrich and enlighten your thoughts and minds,” no
doubt linked to the photo. Too bad that Neuer, wanting to name as many
people as he could in what he undoubtedly knew would be a short
appearance, hadn’t time to report what Sharawi had posted in order “to
enrich and enlighten [Palestinian] thoughts and minds.”
Neuer then mentioned “Husni Mash, an UNRWA teacher in the West Ban,
[who] posted antisemitic conspiracy theories about how Jews control the
world, created the Covid virus, and seek to destroy Islam.”
As for the third teacher, all Neuer managed to say before his video was shut down was this:
“Esraa Abdul Rahim, an UNRWA…”
Then Madame Khan, a true daughter of Pakistan, horrified at
what Neuer had managed to say In his 28 seconds, immediately had the
video shut down. A stunning act of censorship, captured
on video for all to see, by the UNHRC’s Madame President, determined at
all costs to protect members of UNRWA’s staff from being revealed as
antisemites (an admiring photo of Hitler tells us all we need to know
about Nahed Sharawi) and crazed conspiracy theorists, such as Husni
Mash, insisting that Jews control the world, created the Covid virus,
and seek to destroy Islam. The full report on Neuer’s video appearance and shutdown is here. Here is the video of Hillel Neuer:
“UNHRC stops video quoting antisemitic posts by UNRWA teachers,” i24 News, October 3, 2021:
President of the United
Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) Nazhat Shameem Khan on Friday
[October 1] cut off a video presentation by UN Watch Executive Director
Hillel Neuer quoting antisemitic social media posts by UN Relief and
Works Agency (UNRWA) teachers.
After stopping the video, Khan
said that “insulting and inflammatory remarks” were made that amount to
“personal attacks” against individuals. She then went on to say that
the “statement is out of order” before giving the floor to the UK-based
Palestinian Return Centre (PRC), which has been accused of having ties
with Hamas.
What
“personal attacks” did Khan have in mind? Neuer reported that Nahed
Sharawi had posted a photo of Hitler, and had offered on the same
Facebook page, in his own words, “quotes to enrich and enlighten your
thoughts and minds.” That’s it. No “derogatory remarks.” No “personal
attacks.” The same is true of the one sentence Neuer delivered about
Husni Mash, whom he said had on social media had “posted antisemitic
conspiracy theories about how Jews control the world, created the Covid
virus, and seek to destroy Islam.” No editorializing, nothing made up.
Everyone is free to visit Mash’s Facebook page to see his conspiracy
theories on display.
It is altogether fitting that, having shut down the truth-teller
Hillel Neuer after 28 seconds, Khan would then give the floor to a
speaker from a group, the Palestine Return Centre, whose stock in trade
is lies, and that both the German and Israeli governments accuse of
having ties to the terror group Hamas. A 2011 intelligence
service report of the German Ministry of the Interior found that “Hamas
does not operate openly in Europe. Instead it uses, for instance, the
Palestinian Return Centre in London as a forum.”
But that Hamas connection wouldn’t bother Nazhat Shemeem Khan. She
was greatly relieved to have cut Neuer off after 28 seconds, limiting
the damage he might have done to UNRWA’s reputation. Now the Human
Rights Council instead would hear, straight from Gaza, the latest
Palestinian trumped-up grievance against Israel, that it was denying
Gaza water, when in fact Israel recently built a fourth pipeline to
deliver more water to Gaza, and has supplied Gaza with the Watergen
technology that produces water out of the circumambient air. But why
should President Khan care about any of that?
Neuer was highlighting [in his brief appearance] a recent UN Watch report that,
according to the organization’s website, “exposed more than 100
teachers, school principals and other employees that praise Hitler,
propagate hatred against Jews and support terrorist attacks against
Israeli civilians on social media.”
In response to the allegations in the report [of Neuer’s NGO, UN
Watch] , UNRWA announced that it was investigating 10 of its staffers to
determine if any of them violated “social media policies that prohibit
personnel from engaging in non-neutral behaviors online,” according to a
press release from UNRWA.
Why, after the report was released by Hillel Neuer’s NGO about UNRWA
that has “exposed more than 100 teachers, school principals, and other
employees that praise Hitler, propagate hatred against Jews and support
terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians on social media,” is UNRWA
being allowed to investigate itself? And why, when Neuer has identified
more than 100 staffers as antisemites who “praise Hitler and propagate
hatred against Jews,” is UNRWA going to investigate only 10 members of
its staff? On what basis has it decided to ignore the other ninety? Is
UNRWA afraid, as I suspect, of what it might find out and, still worse,
might have to act on?
