Ayalon urges UN rights chief to cancel Iran visit

Deputy FM slams UNHRC for "sabotaging chances of renewing the political process with the Palestinians."

By HERB KEINON
Danny Ayalon 311 (photo credit: Courtesy)
Danny Ayalon 311
(photo credit: Courtesy)
Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon urged visiting UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navanethem Pillay on Wednesday not to go ahead with a planned visit to Iran, saying this will legitimize a regime that “maliciously violates human rights, executes its citizens and openly calls for genocide.”
Ayalon also took the opportunity to slam the UN Human Rights Council, which Pillay supervises, saying it is “sabotaging chances of renewing the political process with the Palestinians.
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The council’s “obsessive occupation with the Goldstone Report, as well as the use of the committee for the political hounding of Israel, have created an atmosphere of hostility and lack of trust which have caused the Palestinians to fortify themselves in their positions and prevents them from returning to the negotiation table,” Ayalon said.
Saying that even the Goldstone Report described the firing of rockets from Gaza as a war crime, Ayalon added, “Today, six such war crimes took place – and no response or denouncement was voiced by the UN. Seeing this double standard, we, as Israelis, find it difficult to take the Human Rights Council seriously.”
The Human Rights Council actually encouraged terrorism by damaging the right to self-defense of democracies dealing with terrorism and asymmetrical warfare, Ayalon said.
He also called for the UN to do more to secure the release of kidnapped IDF soldier Gilad Schalit, and asked Pillay to do all in her power to meet with Schalit.