The first I heard of the Israeli push for its “fair share” of UN posts was in September 2000, just after the failed Camp David peace talks hosted by U.S. President Bill Clinton, and just before violent repression of demonstrations against Ariel Sharon’s visit to the Temple Mount/Al-Aqsa Mosque complex ignited the Second Intifiada.
The Israeli campaign has been waged discretely, but without let-up, in the intervening years.
Now, the UN is responding, big time.
Is this the UN’s contribution to preparations for November’s “peace meeting” (if it is not going to be called a peace conference)?
The Jerusalem Post is reporting today that “The UN is looking for professionals to help in its humanitarian work, and ‘it’s clear that Israelis have the skills’, Stephane Dujarric, a representative of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, told The Jerusalem Post ahead of a recruiting drive at Tel Aviv University on Thursday. ‘In fields such as agricultural development, growing things in very difficult arid terrain, Israelis have the skills and the UN has the jobs’, he said.”
Why didn’t he mention security, or IT — two areas in which Israel excells? Perhaps Dujarric just doesn’t know about Israel’s prowess in those domaines … or maybe Dujarric just thought that might just be too controversial.
The JPost story adds that “Representatives from the World Health Organization, UN-HABITAT, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and the UN Environment Program will be on hand to try to entice Israelis into joining the ranks of the world body. Some of them will be Israelis who have served in senior positions in these organizations. Will the UN succeed in recruiting Israelis to an institution often perceived in this country as anti-Israel? ‘Clearly, the UN has an image problem in Israel’, said Dujarric, ‘and so I think we sometimes have a hard time recruiting people because of the general image the UN has within the Israeli public. It’s clear and understandable that the Israeli perspective of the UN is seen through the prism of the situation that Israelis and people in the Middle East live in’.”
And this guy was the UN spokesman [under Kofi Annan — to assuage the French insistence that the spokesperson’s job should be theirs]!
JPost continues, “But, he insists, ‘there’s much more to the UN, and our challenge is to make sure young Israelis who are considering an international career understand this’. According to Dujarric, the UN as an organization ‘is welcoming and open to people of all nationalities. We’re a global organization, so the nationals of every member state need to feel at home and welcome here’.”
The UN’s recruitment drive in Israel is described in the JPost story here.