Madam, — For Raymond Deane (September 17th), the United Nations' moderation of certain anti-Israel stances is an "indictment" of that organisation and shows that it has been "hijacked by Western interests".
This view ignores the fact that, for most of its existence, the UN General Assembly has been dominated by a solid majority of Islamic and third-world (and, in the Cold War, Soviet-bloc) states that could be relied upon to turn out anti-Israel resolutions year after year. Of 690 resolutions passed by the assembly up to 1989, 429 were directed against Israel, but not one, after 1949, against an Arab country.
The majority bloc includes some of the biggest human rights abusers on the planet, states that qualify well ahead of Israel for Mr Deane's favoured appellation of "rogue state".
Among those to escape censure were Sudan, with its record of genocide against its black population, Syria, where the Assad regime, in one month of 1982, killed as many victims as have died in all of the wars forced on Israel in 60 years, and Iran, the only state to threaten a fellow-member with extinction.
The assembly has convened emergency special sessions to condemn Israeli construction in Jerusalem, but not the Rwanda genocide nor ethnic cleansing in former Yugoslavia. Meanwhile, on the Security Council, Israel is the only country denied the right to hold one of the rotating seats, by virtue of its being blocked from membership of any regional group.
In a further curious disconnnection from reality, Mr Deane suggests that the EU defends Israel as an "outpost of Western imperialism" (whatever that may be in the era of oil at $100-plus a barrel). Not only is this unfair to the EU, with its record of help to the Palestinian cause, but he knows little of the Jewish national movement if he believes its origins or motivation owe much to imperialism; the contrary would be nearer the truth. Perhaps he meant "outpost of Western democracy and liberal values". - Yours etc,
DERMOT MELEADY, Dublin 3.