On Sunday, caretaker Prime Minister Yair Lapid called on United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to "immediately disband" the international organization's committee to investigate the events of Operation Keeper of Fences, which took place in 2021, after statements by one of the committee's investigators considered "anti-Semitic" by Israel. .
A statement issued by Lapid's office, seen by Anadolu Agency, indicated that Lapid sent a letter to Guterres calling on him to "immediately dismiss and dissolve the members of the investigation committee against Israel."
And the Israeli Prime Minister's letter to the Secretary-General of the United Nations stated, "I call on you today to honor your statements regarding this shameful situation, and to correct matters, as this thing cannot go unnoticed."
UN Sec-Gen @AntonioGuterres, I know you're deeply committed to fighting antisemitism.
There are antisemites and those who defend them working at the @UN.
I call on you to dismiss the members of the @UN_HRC's COI and disband this moral travesty of a commission once and for all.
pic.twitter.com/aiqdKXe8aY
— יאיר לפיד – Yair Lapid (@yairlapid) July 31, 2022
Melon Kothari, one of the committee's members, had hinted, during a recent interview with the "Mondoweiss" website, which covers news about the Palestinian territories, Israel and US policies, that there is a "Jewish lobby", questioning the legitimacy of Israel's membership in the United Nations.
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"We are very frustrated with social media networks that are largely controlled by the Jewish lobby or some specific NGOs that devote a lot of money to trying to discredit us," he added.
Committee Chair Navi Pillay, former High Commissioner for Human Rights, confirmed Thursday that Kothari's comments "appear to have been deliberately taken out of context" and "wrongly conveyed." Pillay added that these statements reflected the committee's "disappointment with Israel's continued lack of cooperation." with the experts.
Lapid considered that Pillay's defense of Kothari was "erroneous", accusing the committee of "fueling" anti-Semitism, and continued, "The slanders about a Jewish lobby that controls the media remind us of the darkest days of modern history."
Some diplomats, including Americans and British, condemned Kothari's comments on Twitter.
The “guardian of the fences” is the name given by Israel to a military operation in Gaza that took place between May 10 and 21, 2021.
It is noteworthy that the Human Rights Council had established the UN Commission of Inquiry on human rights violations committed in the occupied Palestinian territories and Israel since April 13, 2021.
The committee was established after the 11-day war between the Palestinian resistance factions and the Israeli occupation in May 2021, and the Israeli artillery and air strikes on the Gaza Strip killed 260 people, including 66 children, according to the authorities in the Strip, while 13 people, including a soldier on the Israeli side, were killed by missiles fired. From Gaza, according to the occupation police.