CAA applauds British Government for boycotting controversial Durban IV event
Campaign Against Antisemitism applauds the British Government for announcing its decision to boycott the controversial United Nations “Durban IV” event.
The decision follows “serious concerns” of antisemitism which have been present at previous Durban events.
Campaign Against Antisemitism had called last month on the British Government to boycott this year’s Durban IV event, following a similar decision by the United States, Australia and Canada.
The Durban conferences, while presented under the guise of combatting racism, have previously provided a stage for antisemitic hate speech and actions. At the original 2001 conference in the South African city, there were attempts to equate Zionism with racism, in an echo of the United Nations’ darkest period. Subsequent review conferences in the Durban series have included the distribution of the notorious antisemitic propaganda, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, an early twentieth-century forgery long used to incite mob violence against Jews, as well as then-Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad referring to the Holocaust as “ambiguous and dubious.”
Earlier this year, Campaign Against Antisemitism reported that the UN General Assembly approved an operating budget that includes money to commemorate the Durban conference, an event which has been widely described as antisemitic.
Despite protests from the United States, the $3.231 billion budget containing a provision to mark the notorious 2001 World Conference Against Racism in Durban, South Africa, was approved. The General Assembly voted 167 in favour, with only the United States and Israel voting against.
The Durban conference was dominated by clashes over the Middle East. The US and Israel walked out over a draft resolution that equated Zionism with racism. The language was amended in the final documents, but the conference was seen as the beginnings of the boycott of Israel known as BDS, the tactics of which an overwhelming majority of British Jews believe are intimidatory.
