Illustrative United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres speaks during a news conference. May 11, 2022. REUTERS/Lisa Leutner

Jewish groups across the world are calling on the Secretary General of the United Nations (UN) to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism in the run-up to a major UN conference in June.

“We have long recognized that in order to combat antisemitism we must understand it,” said an open letter signed by American Jewish Committee, Campaign Against Antisemitism, World Jewish Congress, the Anti-Defamation League, and others. “It is our collective view that the non-legally binding [IHRA] Definition of Antisemitism is an indispensable tool to understand and fight antisemitism, and one that can be used entirely consistently with fundamental human rights standards.”

The letter added that since 2016 the IHRA definition has been adopted by 40 nations, as well as governments, businesses, and universities, arguing that it “can help governments and individuals at all levels of society recognize antisemitism.”

It follows a missive issued in April by over 100 non-governmental organizations, imploring the UN not to adopt the IHRA definition because of its alleged undermining of the right of Palestinians and pro-Palestinian groups to criticize Israel.

“The IHRA definition has often been used to wrongly label criticism of Israel as antisemitic, and this chill and sometimes suppress non-violent protest, activism and speech critical of Israel and/or Zionism, including the US and Europe,” it said.

On Sunday, Campaign Against Antisemitism, a London-based nonprofit, noted in a press release that the anti-IHRA letter was signed by “numerous controversial activist groups” such as Amnesty International, J-Street, and Human Rights Watch, each of which have been criticized for ignoring the complexities of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to turn the world against Israel.

“Fighting antisemitism may not be popular because Jews are one of the world’s smaller minorities, but if the UN is not able to protect the world’s more vulnerable communities, then what purpose does it serve?” CAA said.

On June 20-21, the UN will host in Cordoba, Spain a forum to discuss global antisemitism and antisemitism among its members and officers. In the past, the body, established in 1945 just over a month and a half after Germany surrendered to the Allied Powers and thus ended World War II, has failed to denounce antisemitic comments made by UN commissioners such as Miloon Kothari, who said in July 2022 that the “Jewish lobby” controls social media.

Additionally, UN agencies have been accused of demonstrating anti-Israel bias. In 2016, the World Heritage Committee of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) excluded Jewish names for structures like the Temple Mount, referring to it solely as Al-Aqsa Mosque, from a list of holy sites in Jerusalem, and in December, the UN General Assembly held a controversial vote on a resolution asking the International Court of Justice to issue an advisory opinion on the “occupied” Palestinian territories after observance of Shabbat began, a decision that forced the Israeli mission to the UN to ask their US colleagues to vote against the measure on their behalf by proxy.

“The decision to hold a vote that deals with Israel on Shabbat is another example of the moral decay of the UN,” Israeli Ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan said before the vote took place, adding that it “prevents Israel’s positions from being heard in a vote whose results are predetermined.”

Most recently, the UN held last Monday a “Nakba Day” ceremony to which Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas was invited as the keynote speaker. Israel and 44 other countries, including the US, the UK, and Ukraine, refused to attend the event.

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.