The Jewish people are often known as a people of history. We have memories of events that stretch back through the vast expanses of time to our very origins on this earth.
We remember Abraham, the first Jew, who embarked on a mission that changed the course of humankind. About 4000 years ago he made a covenant with God, called the Brit Milah where all Jewish males would be circumcised. It’s a covenant and practice we continue to do today.
We remember Moses, our greatest prophet who led us out of Egypt from slavery into freedom – an event called Pesach (or Passover) that we celebrate to this very day and will be doing this very week.
We remember King David, whose gift of words and poetry we still recite today. And we remember his son, Solomon, who built the First Jewish Temple in Jerusalem about 3000 years ago.
And we also remember how we revolted against Roman rule and fought the mightiest empire of the time 2000 years ago.
And for the Jews of the world, we remember our holy city of Jerusalem, a city we turned to in our prayers every day and a city we never forgot.
But this long history of ours is… well… it’s annoying and inconvenient, because when you deal with an organisation like UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), truth and facts will always get in the way of a good fairy tale.
And oh what a tale they weave…
Because they have just passed a resolution that simply … ignores all the history of the Jewish people above. Poof! What Jewish people??
According to the resolution, Israel is an “occupying power” of the Arabic al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram al-Sharif areas. They fail to mention the term Temple Mount. In other words, according to them we’re occupying ourselves?
And of course, because we’re all evil, we’ve also been accused of planting fake Jewish graves in spaces of Muslim commentaries and of “the continued conversion of many Islamic and Byzantine remains into the so-called Jewish ritual baths or into Jewish prayer places.”
They also refer to the Tomb of the Patriarchs and Rachel’s Tomb as an integral part of Palestine. Oh very integral indeed, since Palestine has been around for…what – 15 minutes?
UNESCO tales are more suited to the magical world of Hogwarts than the real one we live in. In their world, there is fantasy and dragons and magical kingdoms that have existed for thousands of years.
And it seems the Arabs love their fantasies too, because some of the countries that submitted that resolution are all known for their great contribution to storytelling, such as Qatar (slave labour is alive and kicking at the next World Cup), Egypt (we left – get over it!), Lebanon (boom boom – Hezbullah is in the room), and Sudan (how is the tourism industry going? Many visitors?).
I never expect much from those countries and they always meet my expectations perfectly!
Then, of course they were supported by others such as France (we will fight terror…with appeasement! So in the meantime we’ll quickly try create another Arab state so that maybe they’ll like us), Russia (it’s not personal, it’s just business) and Sweden (ah screw it, we’re going down anyway, might as well join the terrorists – and maybe they’ll kill us last… right after the French).
Yesh Atid leader, Yair Lapid, said the following: “UNESCO prides itself on promoting tolerance, inter-faith and inter-cultural dialogue yet it passes resolutions which erases the Jewish people from the historical narrative. This latest one-sided resolution is a stain on the United Nations”
Well, yes…and no. It’s a stain alright, but in an organisation with so many stains already, how could you even notice one more?
