‘Zionism is racism’: Death of U.N. dream

By Jeane Kirkpatrick

Transcribed from the clipping

“Ten years ago, on Nov. 10, 1975, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution branding Zionism as racism. Adoption of this resolution was tantamount to declaring Israel an illegitimate state based on an illegitimate philosophy… By an almost unbearable coincidence, the resolution was passed on the anniversary of Kristalnacht, Nov. 10, 1938… Now 37 years later, in the very institution established to eliminate violence from international life, the Jewish state was marked for destruction.… To appreciate the full significance of the Zionism-is-racism resolution, it is necessary to understand the meaning of ‘racism’ and ‘aggression’ in U.N. usage. In the language of the United Nations, ‘racism’ is the ultimate political crime, the ultimate violation of human rights. A state based on racism is then an outlaw state, unworthy of membership in what is euphemistically termed the ‘family of nations.’ A racist state has no rights at all, not even the right to defend itself.… Thus, the Zionism-is-racism resolution declared open season on Israel. Henceforth, Israel would be fair game for armed ‘liberation.’… the Soviet Union has played a substantial role in the campaign to delegitimize Israel by co-sponsoring the original Zionism-is-racism resolution and 10 years later, at the Nairobi conference on the Decade of Women, is still pushing that famous equation.”

Context added by this archive

A former American ambassador to the United Nations marks the tenth anniversary and sets out, more plainly than anyone else in this archive, why the word mattered: in that building racism is the charge from which no state is permitted to defend itself. Her example of where the formula had surfaced most recently is the women’s conference at Nairobi. She spells it Kristalnacht.

Cite this item

"‘Zionism is racism’: Death of U.N. dream," The Macon Telegraph, 12 November 1985. Covering Palestine archive, CP-1985-004. https://coveringpalestine.org/archive/cp-1985-004

Elsewhere in the archive

U.N. General Assembly lists anti-Semitism as form of racismThe Macon Telegraph · 10 December 1998 · the same newspaper
Northern Border Secured, Says Israeli EnvoyThe Arizona Republic · 3 February 1985 · the same year
No Travel Permits to U.N. ConferenceTelegram & Gazette · 10 July 1985 · the same year
Kenyan resolution saves women’s conferenceTimes-News · 28 July 1985 · the same year

This record is part of Covering Palestine, an archive of American and Anglophone newspaper clippings about Palestinians, 1812 to 2022. Researched and assembled by Maria Robles.

The clipping belongs to the newspaper that printed it, or to the wire service that supplied the copy. It is reproduced here for research, criticism and commentary.

Something wrong here, or something you know about this clipping? The archive is still being built and corrections are wanted: maria@rozumstudio.com, quoting CP-1985-004.

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