ebacle At Durban

Paleseinian and
hand
protesters
in hand during
a protest: mar on
Aug: 31: in Durbait,-
SOUth Africa.

PhooD AP/Karel Prinsloo

The Debacle At Durban

Faced with hostility at U.N. forum, Jewish activists seek to place blame.

MICHAEL J. JORDAN

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Durban, South Africa
s the U.N. World Conference Against
Racism lurches toward a conclusion,
shell-shocked Jewish officials are lashing
out at the parties they hold responsible
for the virulent anti-Semitic and anti-Israel attacks.
The Palestinians and the Arab world would be an
obvious target for the IsraelLbashing, except that the
only surprising thing about their well-orchestrated
propaganda campaign was its scope and intensity.
Rather, Jewish politicians and activists are venting
their anger at the United Nations, governments,
human rights groups and thousands of non-govern-
mental organizations perceived as complicit in the anti-
Israel attacks, either by their support or by their silence.
The incidents are too numerous to count, activists say.
On the grounds of the U.N. conference itself, the
Arab Lawyers Union distributed pamphlets filled
with grotesque caricatures of hook-nosed Jews depict-
ed as Nazis, spearing Palestinian children, dripping
blood from their fangs, with missiles bulging from
their eyes or with pots of money nearby.
Attempts to have the group's U.N. accreditation
revoked
were refused.
Tuff :
Under the tent where the final NGO declaration
.(0
9/7 was approved over the weekend — a document that

A

2001

18

indicts Israel as a "racist, apartheid state" guilty of
genocide and ethnic cleansing — fliers were found
with a photo of Hitler and the following question:
"What if Hitler had won? There would be no Israel,
and no Palestinian bloodshed."
In a Palestinian-led march with thousands of par-
ticipants, a placard was held aloft that read "Hitler
Should Have Finished the Job." Nearby, someone
was selling the most notorious of anti-Jewish tracts,
"The Protocols of the Elders of Zion."
Many participants have sought to explain away
such incidents as political speech or the work of
"extremists." In fact, there has been a confluence of
factors, Jewish observers say. Among them:
• Many delegates who are ignorant or naive about
the Middle East have been bombarded with extreme
demonization of Israel and the Jews.
• An anti-America, anti-globalization animus from
the Third World — fueled by a speech from Cuban
President Fidel Castro and the perceived U.S. refusal
to discuss reparations for slavery — may have been
projected onto Israel as America's ally.
• The ambitions of U.N. High Commissioner for
Human Rights Mary Robinson, who may need to
curry favor with the Arab world if she hopes to
replace Kofi Annan as U.N. secretary-general.
• The ease and convenience of scapegoating a
tiny minority — 13 million Jews — for many of
the world's ills.

Genocide" Unacceptable

Throughout the conference's first week, Jews com-
plained of being constantly under threat and attack,
verbally if not physically.
After a day in which she felt under siege as a Jew
and defender of Israel, one activist burst into tears
while singing Hatikvah, Israel's national anthem, at a
Shabbat dinner hosted by Durban's Jewish commu-
nity.
A Dutch delegate said she was srunned by the
atmosphere.
"My father survived the Holocaust and my mother
was hidden, so when I see these cartoons I see what
was going on in 1930s Germany," said Hadassa
Hirschfeld, the adjunct director of the Hague-based
Center Information and Documentation Israel.
"No one's speaking out for us against the hate. I'm
so sick of it. It's all covered up, that it's 'against Israel,' "
Hirschfeld said. "But this is against the Jews. And if
they don't speak out, then the world is silent again."
The U.S. delegation did its talking with its feet,
walking out Monday when it appeared that the offi-
cial governmental declaration would single out Israel
for criticism. The Israeli delegation followed suit,
walking out Monday as well.
In a press conference Tuesday, Robinson, the for-
mer president of Ireland, defended herself against
the suggestion that she could be blamed if the con-
ference collapses.