Israel calls for end to hostility at United Nations

By Bill Rigby 
August 15, 2005
Reuters
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N15647071.htm http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N15647071.htm 

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 15 (Reuters) - The Gaza pullout should mark an end to U.N. hostility against Israel, a top Israeli diplomat said on Monday, urging the world body to support the withdrawal as a historic move toward peace. 

The call by Israeli U.N. Ambassador Dan Gillerman came as thousands of Jewish settlers began to leave Gaza, ending Israel's 38-year occupation of the coastal strip, the first step in Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to disengage from conflict with the Palestinians. 
The comments echoed previous calls by Israel and the United States, its closest ally, to halt the litany of anti-Israel resolutions passed by the U.N. General Assembly each year and dismantle the extensive bureaucracy built up around the Palestinian cause. 

It is time for the United Nations to acknowledge Israel's actions, Gillerman told a news conference. We hope that in the United Nations there will be no more business as usual as far as the Middle East is concerned ... No more Israel-bashing, no more ongoing resolutions which keep repeating themselves time after time. 

The 191-nation General Assembly, dominated by developing nations, usually passes about two dozen resolutions criticizing Israel each year, often virtually identical to previous resolutions. 

The resolutions put forward by Arab states typically win the support of the vast majority of U.N. members, opposed only by Israel, the United States and a few Pacific island states. 
We hope we will see a more positive and a less combative General Assembly, recognizing that something dramatic, historic has happened, said Gillerman. 
He also called for U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to show his support for Israel's withdrawal from Gaza. 

Annan, in a statement on Monday, described Israel's move as a moment of promise and hope in the Middle East peace process but warned that considerable work remained ahead. 
Annan has often praised the Gaza withdrawal plan in the past while cautioning that it should be viewed as a step in the peace process rather than an isolated move. 
He has also been critical of both the General Assembly's anti-Israel resolutions and some Israeli tactics. 

Israel has long viewed the U.N. membership as hostile, ignoring the deaths of Jews and suicide bombings and failing to condemn Iraq for firing missiles at Tel Aviv during the 1990 Gulf War even as it incessantly criticizes Israeli actions. 

The United Nations has many bodies dedicated to the Palestinian cause, including the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, the Special Committee to Investigate Israeli Practices Affecting the Human Rights of the Palestinian People and the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.