Peaceloving At The UN
Korey, William
PEACE L0VING AT THE UN How should the U.S. respond to the growing effort to expel Israel from the United Nations? Arab League Foreign Ministers, meeting in Tunis on February 13, reached a...
...Public airing of the facts might well prove embarrassing...
...William Korey is Director of International Policy Research for B'nai B' rith International and author of The Soviet Cage...
...All too often the relationship in the past has been inverse...
...Iraq, which has unleashed war against Iran...
...Presumably, the assessment decision of the UN is based upon "the principle of the capacity to pay...
...But the gross abridgment of the principle is obvious...
...The 86 countries in-the majority contribute slightly less than 23 percent of the total UN budget...
...Kirkpatrick is known to feel that anti-U.S...
...General Assembly resolutions, unlike Security Council decisions, are not binding...
...Only seven are identified in the annual Freedom House survey, published in early 1981, as "free" societies...
...Just as the UN Charter assures majority rule, it protects minority rights...
...Their resolution, sponsored by 24 Senators and 49 Congressmen, is precise...
...And plans to prevent the seating of the Israeli delegation at the UN-sponsored conference in Geneva in April were frustrated only because of U.S...
...While the civilized world focused on the monumental tragedy in Cambodia and, in a race against starvation and death, initially had pledged through the UN well over $200 million, the Arab oil giants offered little...
...Two weeks later, however, the President of the Assembly, Foreign Minister A. Bouteflika of Algeria, unilaterally and arbitrarily ruled that South Africa was henceforth deprived of its right to participate in any of the Assembly's proceedings...
...Strikingly, each of the 21 countries that voted against the resolution is a democracy with strong built-in guarantees for minority rights...
...It was the first triple veto in UN history and overrode ten positive votes...
...That pattern frequently prevails at the UN—a striking inverse relationship between size of vote and amount of assessments...
...Fundamental Charter principles are fairly new to most UN members...
...That may very well be changing...
...When the British and American Ambassadors challenged the ruling, the chair put the matter to a vote of the Assembly...
...Moynihan explained that the U. S. would continue to sit in the Security Council "to maintain our veto...
...Kuwait, after a year's delay, finally pledged a half-million dollars...
...World Bank figures on Gross National Product per capita may show that the three richest countries of the globe are Arab petropowers (two others rank very high and the others are well above the median level), but they have arranged to be assessed at scandalously low figures...
...It could be moved at the Special Session of the General Assembly dealing with disarmament beginning on June 9, or it could be proposed at the forthcoming International Labor Organization meetings in Geneva opening on June 2. (The ILO, as a UN Specialized Agency, is enjoined to "conform" with the UN resolution...
...Ambassador Arthur Goldberg urged that "the United States should make it clear before this expulsion or suspension proposal gains momentum that if Israel is unlawfully denied its proper seat in the Assembly, the United States will not participate in the Assembly deliberations...
...Libya, which wages a worldwide war of terrorism...
...The vindictive sponsors, in the initial draft, included the term UN "bodies" as well, which would have plunged UN peacekeeping and refugee programs into turmoil...
...The "commitment" presumably had to do with being "peace-loving...
...Two of the petropowers—Bahrein and Oman— contribute the absolute minimum amount of annual dues—a ludicrous $57,000 each...
...The General Assembly vote was 86 to 21 with 34 abstentions and 16 absent...
...But legal niceties have not always been the forte of the Third World militants...
...Thus, on February 5, 1982, the groundwork was laid for Israel's expulsion from the United Nations...
...On September 20,1980, the 42-member Islamic Conference, meeting in Fez, Morocco, resolved to press for Israel's removal at the next session of the General Assembly...
...But if their financial threats or offers can buy votes, they themselves contribute extraordinarily little to the UN—a miniscule 1.4 percent of the UN budget...
...In addition, all UN specialized agencies and international institutions were asked "to conform" with the ban...
...A whopping majority, 91-22, upheld the ruling...
...Syria, the moving force behind the resolution, was even considering inserting an immediate challenge to Israel's credentials, but a timely State Department warning, effectively utilized by the U.S...
...Ambassador Kirkpat-rick called the resolution a "cynical misuse of power," demonstrating that the "United Nations itself can be used to polarize nations, spread hostility, exacerbate conflict...
...An additional provision of the resolution, clearly designed to reinforce such a challenge, alleges that Israel did not carry out "its commitment" under the 1949 General Assembly resolution (number 273) which admitted it as a member-state...
...The base period was deliberately pushed back to 197177, significantly lowering the average, since, during 1971-73, oil income was relatively modest...
...Among the 86 countries that voted for the resolution, only 13 were original UN Charter signers...
...Should this warning be disregarded, he added, "we should then take the further step of freezing our pro-rata contribution to the Assembly expenses...
...The normal averaging base period would have been 1975-77, during which oil income skyrocketed...
...The absurdly asymmetrical assessment decision of the UN was achieved in 1979 by some high level statistical chicanery...
...What was even more stunning about the pent-up fury which had burst forth was the verbal assault upon the United States for casting a veto in the Security Council on January 20...
...Much will depend on whether the bloc-voting system at the UN can be broken...
...Such reports can be the basis for further action by key UN organs...
...on our relations with every country" that supported it...
...Under the UN Charter's Article 5 (dealing with suspension of the "rights and privileges of membership") and Article 6 (dealing with expulsion of a member who has "persistently violated [UN] principles") the only decisive authority is the Security Council...
...Momentum for the ouster of Israel from the international community has in fact been building for several years...
...The decision proved "premature"—as reported in the press—due to a bitter split in Arab ranks over the Iran-Iraq war...
...One provision requires the UN Secretary-General to report every two months on progress of implementation...
...Kafkaesque" was the term used by one diplomat to characterize the debate and vote...
...Sponsors of the resolution included Syria, which has rejected all peace negotiations with Israel and occupied parts of Lebanon...
...actions...
...But, as the fighting diminished, the Islamic Conference, meeting in Taif, Saudi Arabia in late January 1981, called for a "holy war" (jihad) against Israel...
...In sharp contrast, Senator Moynihan declared that "we think it is unwise" not to disclose precisely "what our action would be...
...It read: "We have made it clear that suspension or expulsion of Israel from the UN or any UN body would have serious consequences for United States participation in and support for the UN or the UN body affected...
...The General Assembly can act upon either suspension or expulsion only "upon the recommendation of the Security Council...
...Without the Soviet Union's contribution (some 13 percent), the majority gives about eight percent of the UN budget...
...And, to demonstrate further their commitment to UN financial upkeep, the petropowers helped push through a decision in the 1981 General Assembly that for future assessments, the base period would be extended from seven to ten years...
...respond to a successful challenge to Israel's credentials...
...What emerges is a gross asymmetry in members' contributions to the regular UN budget...
...The U.S.' negative vote had been aimed at a Council resolution on the Golan Heights issue which imposed sanctions upon Israel...
...In earlier years, when vetoes were cast by the USSR— there were over 100 of them—its right to do so was never subject to Assembly censure...
...Keen observers expect that the Assembly ban will seriously hinder the resumption of diplomatic relations between African countries and Israel...
...to the UN is not sacrosanct...
...Ambassador, called the "tyranny of the majority...
...The impact of the Arab bloc upon voting patterns is greased by the Arab petropowers—Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Libya, Iraq, Bahrein, Oman, Algeria and Qatar...
...This unprecedented attack upon the veto right struck at the very foundation of the UN Charter, even as the implied challenge to Israel's membership threatened the Charter principle of universality...
...In a letter to Senator Charles Percy, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, a high State Department official wrote that "it would not be wise to declare specifically in advance what the U.S...
...response would be...
...Almost eight percent more is contributed by the abstainers and absent...
...The not-inconsiderable 25 percent contribution of the U.S...
...When the question of Israel's expulsion was first mooted in 1975 (the subject was quickly dropped several months later), former U.S...
...Resolution supporters were not yet prepared to ascertain what the "serious consequences" included...
...The rupture paralyzed unified action on Israel...
...UNIFIL in Sinai and UNDOF in Southern Lebanon would have been obliged to suspend operations as would the vast UNRWA Palestine relief program on the West Bank and Gaza...
...No country, not even South Africa, has ever been subjected by the UN to such a massive ban...
...Such acts, he noted, "destroy the authority of the United Nations" and encourage "disrespect for the Charter and for the traditions of our organization...
...The ultimate purpose of the resolution was implied in the section pronouncing the formal judgment that Israel is not a "peace-loving state...
...Congressional action is essential if her warnings— and those of the State Department— are to carry weight...
...The late Hans J. Morgenthau, in Congressional testimony, characterized "the core of a typical voting majority of the General Assembly" as "mini-states which are lacking in all or most attributes of nationhood" and which could not exist "without foreign subsidies" that come from powerful groups "such as the Soviet and Arab blocs...
...and Dr...
...That stunning decision went unreported...
...A decade later, referring to Israel's possible exclusion, he suggested what might be a compelling reason: ". . .the United Nations will not survive if its basic law is violated by a majority in a matter of transcendent importance, such as the rights of its members...
...A study, initiated by the U.S...
...Responding to the bidding of the PLO, the "Final Declaration" of Havana specifically called for Israel's "exclusion from the international community...
...If Israel is judged not peace-loving, its credentials as a member of the United Nations could be challenged...
...the bloc system creates a sense of power...
...Exclusion, whether through expulsion or suspension, poses serious legal hurdles for the Arab militants...
...Still, they offer a world-community sanction that legitimizes Arab pressures upon various countries that are particularly vulnerable...
...Ambassador Kirkpatrick signalled the change when she reportedly told Assembly President Ismat Kittani that the Israel ban resolution "could have an impact...
...A nightmare game in which words had "lost all meaning"—as the diplomat noted—was played out from the General Assembly podium...
...Two others—Qatar and Oman—pledged an infinitesimal $10,000 each...
...The proposed quarantine was all-embracing and included exclusion from military aid programs, economic and technological relations, and the severing of diplomatic and cultural ties...
...The six other petropowers have offered no assistance at all...
...His article, "Brezhnev's Jewish Problem," appeared in the July-August 1981 issue of moment...
...The specifics of a U.S...
...In 1979, the petropowers contributed only five percent of what UNRWA raised—$6.3 million...
...Perhaps it is time for the United States to reconsider its financial support, especially if the Charter is subverted by a drive to exclude the Jewish State...
...it might also prompt corrective action...
...Somewhat more than half of the Assembly's membership contributes only 1.75 percent of the UN budget...
...The UN Office of Legal Affairs, in November 1970, had ruled that under the Charter, the Assembly may not deprive a member-state of membership...
...might withhold funds to the UN for strong and compelling reasons...
...members stands at the core of the UN peacekeeping system...
...Her warning has more than likely fallen on deaf ears...
...The analysis highlights the extraordinary anomaly in UN voting habits...
...Their decision went unnoticed in the Western world...
...Congressman Kemp added that it was important to send "an explicit message" that would be "tough enough to deter any action" by the UN against Israel...
...Israel was declared formally to be "not a peace-loving state...
...In 1965, when he was Ambassador to the UN, Goldberg was officially authorized to declare formally that the U.S...
...The 21 countries that voted against the resolution provide 70 percent of the UN budget...
...Indeed, the veto right of the five permanent Security Council WILLIAM KOREY "Why should the United States support and finance organizations which are explicitly and seriously undermining our own most basic commitments and those of our friends and allies...
...Ambassador Kirkpatrick felt compelled to lecture her colleagues that fundamental constitutional issues such as the veto right and the universality principle "cannot be settled by majority passions...
...They resolved to take "all the necessary measures to expel Israel from the United Nations [and] its Specialized Agencies...
...This rather archaic language is drawn from Article IV of the UN Charter which stipulates that "membership in the United Nations is open to all other peace-loving states...
...That the resolution was prompted less by the Golan Heights issue (which presumably triggered the action) than by anti-Israel hysteria was apparent...
...response did not, however, have the support of the State Department...
...Congressman Tom Lantos, a few days after the UN action, introduced a formal resolution stating "that any action by the United Nations or any UN body to prevent a democratic state from exercising its rights under the Charter to participate in the United Nations will have the most serious and harmful consequences for further Congressional support for the United Nations...
...In its inimitable way, the UN seemed to be commemorating the centenary of the Czech novelist...
...The plan was first projected at the conference of the "non-aligned" held in Cuba in the late summer of 1979...
...A built-in feature of the resolution will enable its sponsors to apply continuous pressure...
...votes cast by individual countries at the UN should not be suffered with impunity...
...In contrast, 75 percent of the original Charter signers—38 member-states—either voted against the resolution or abstained...
...It is the West (particularly the United States) that has been picking up the tab...
...Lantos said it was his intention to send "a clear and unambiguous message" to the UN that America will not "underwrite" such "irresponsible antics" as removal of "one of its few free and democratic members...
...The leverage at the disposal of the West is considerable—but only if it has the will to use it...
...She warned that the extraordinary Assembly action constituted an "ominous portent...
...Resort to an extra-legal—indeed illegal—maneuver dealing with credentials is certain to be considered...
...Mission to the UN, of the relationship between the voting pattern of a particular country and the amount of aid rendered it under bilateral programs would be most revealing...
...delegation, had a dampening effect...
...It would have the U. S. suspend its participation in the General Assembly and withhold its assessment should Israel be "expelled, suspended, denied its credentials or in any manner denied its rights and privileges in the General Assembly...
...It was the first time in UN history that a Security Council permanent member was chastised by the Assembly merely for exercising its veto right under the UN Charter...
...After the UN Secretary-General explained the implications, a chagrined joint Arab-Communist leadership decided to remove the term...
...Nor do the petropowers demonstrate much compassion for UN refugee programs...
...Arab League Foreign Ministers, meeting in Tunis on February 13, reached a decision that is virtually certain to bring them—and, just possibly, the majority of United Nations member-states—into a collision course with the United States...
...It was understood by the founders that without at least the tacit acquiescence of the major powers on critical issues, the maintenance of peace would be impossible...
...Last April, at a UN-sponsored conference on African refugees, only three Arab petropowers pledged, and the amount they offered was about seven percent of the total...
...And this view resonates widely in the Congress...
...In contrast, most nations in the 86-country majority are either totalitarian or authoritarian regimes, military dictatorships or monarchies...
...Even UN relief for the Palestinians (UNWRA) hardly attracts adequate Arab support...
...Cuba, whose mercenaries serve aggression in various countries...
...Most of the Third World is reluctant to split off from their respective blocs, even if it means supporting irresponsible courses...
...Moreover, until now, Third World votes did not materially affect relations with the United States...
...His anger had solid legal underpinnings...
...But, as the Arab League decision of February 13 makes clear, the expulsion effort is on the immediate agenda...
...The new Assembly decision, set forth in resolution form, stated that it "strongly deplores" the veto cast by "a permanent member"— which everyone knew referred to the U.S...
...Whether either resolution, even if it wins strong Congressional endorsements, will interrupt the Arab expulsion drive is by no means certain...
...Instead of the three-year base period for averaging purposes which had been characteristic of earlier assessments, the General Assembly, again manipulated by the petropowers, voted to extend the base period to seven years and thereby "alleviate the sharp variations in rates of assessment" for those "countries whose national incomes had risen rapidly in recent years...
...As recently as last January, Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick declared: "I find it very difficult to see why we should support and finance organizations which are explicitly and seriously undermining our own most basic values and commitments and those of our friends and allies...
...Close analysis of the voting pattern on February 5 points the way...
...In February, a conference of the non-aligned, meeting in New Delhi, decided to propose a challenge to Israel's credentials at the General Assembly...
...Even more revealing is the position taken by various political regimes...
...Moreover, their growing commercial relations could be negatively affected...
...This is less than is contributed by the United States alone (25 percent...
...Even stronger than the Lantos proposal is a resolution introduced in both houses of Congress on March 12 by Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Congressman Jack Kemp...
...With the veto power in the hands of the latter group, it is inconceivable that the U.S...
...Legality was capriciously swept aside by what John Scali, the U.S...
...On October 30,1974, the Council rejected the recommendation through the casting of a triple veto (U.S., U.K., and France...
...That decision was rooted in the February 5 resolution of the UN General Assembly emergency session, an extraordinary and unprecedented resolution which demanded that "all member-states . . . cease forthwith, individually and collectively, all dealings with Israel in order totally to isolate her in all fields...
...or, for that matter, England and France) would permit such a grave act as exclusion to be applied to Israel...
...the USSR, whose armies are in Afghanistan and threaten Polish freedom...
...Precedent for such a maneuver was provided in the fall of 1974, when the General Assembly's Credentials Committee recommended rejection of the credentials of the South Afriean delegation and called upon the Security Council to "review the relationship between the United Nations and South Africa...
...But it was clear that it was blood—Israeli blood—that the group was after...
...Indeed, not since the UN equated Zionism with racism in 1975 had the world organization succumbed to such a vast outpouring of unabashed bigotry against the Jewish State...
Vol. 7 • May 1982 • No. 5
