Votes of Resolution 3379
| UN General Assembly Resolution 3379 | |
|---|---|
| Date | 10 November 1975 |
| Meeting no. | 2400 |
| Code | A/RES/3379 (Document) |
| Subject | Elimination of all forms of racial discrimination |
Voting summary |
|
| Result | Adopted, but revoked on 16 December 1991 |
United Nations General Assembly Resolution 3379, adopted on 10 November 1975, "Determines that Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination" with 72 votes in favour, 35 votes against, and 32 abstentions. It was revoked by Resolution 46/86, adopted on 16 December 1991 with 111 votes in favour, 25 votes against, and 13 abstentions. [1] The vote for Resolution 3379 was held nearly one year after the adoption of Resolution 3236 and Resolution 3237: the former recognized the "Question of Palestine" and invited the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) to participate in international diplomacy; and the latter designated the PLO as a non-member Assembly observer following the "Olive Branch Speech" by Palestinian political leader Yasser Arafat.
In the context of the Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, adopted on 10 November 1963, Resolution 3379 officially condemned the national ideology of the State of Israel. It was sponsored by the Arab League and a number of Muslim-majority countries, and was chiefly supported by in-favour votes from the Second World and many African countries. Israel, which had been granted United Nations membership in 1949, voted against Resolution 3379 and subsequently condemned it, and was chiefly supported by the First World.
In July 1920, at the San Remo conference, a Class "A" League of Nations mandate over Palestine was allocated to the British. The preamble of the mandate document declared:
Whereas the Principal Allied Powers have also agreed that the Mandatory should be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on November 2nd, 1917, by the Government of His Britannic Majesty, and adopted by the said Powers, in favour of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing should be done which might prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country. [2]
On 29 November 1947, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution recommending "to the United Kingdom, as the mandatory Power for Palestine, and to all other Members of the United Nations the adoption and implementation, with regard to the future government of Palestine, of the Plan of Partition with Economic Union" as Resolution 181 (II). [3] The plan contained a proposal to terminate the British Mandate for Palestine and partition Palestine into "independent Arab and Jewish States and the Special International Regime for the City of Jerusalem." On 14 May 1948, the day on which the British Mandate over Palestine expired, the Jewish People's Council gathered at the Tel Aviv Museum, and approved a proclamation which declared the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz Israel, to be known as the State of Israel . [4]
On 11 May 1949, Israel was admitted to membership in the United Nations. [5]
The full text of Resolution 3379: [6] [7]
3379 (XXX). Elimination of all forms of racial discrimination
The General Assembly,
Recalling its resolution 1904 (XVIII) of 20 November 1963, proclaiming the United Nations Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, and in particular its affirmation that "any doctrine of racial differentiation or superiority is scientifically false, morally condemnable, socially unjust and dangerous" and its expression of alarm at "the manifestations of racial discrimination still in evidence in some areas in the world, some of which are imposed by certain Governments by means of legislative, administrative or other measures",
Recalling also that, in its resolution 3151 G (XXVIII) of 14 December 1973, the General Assembly condemned, inter alia, the unholy alliance between South African racism and zionism,
Taking note of the Declaration of Mexico on the Equality of Women and Their Contribution to Development and Peace 1975, proclaimed by the World Conference of the International Women's Year, held at Mexico City from 19 June to 2 July 1975, which promulgated the principle that "international co-operation and peace require the achievement of national liberation and independence, the elimination of colonialism and neo-colonialism, foreign occupation, zionism, apartheid and racial discrimination in all its forms, as well as the recognition of the dignity of peoples and their right to self-determination",
Taking note also of resolution 77 (XII) adopted by the Assembly of Heads of State and Government of the Organization of African Unity at its twelfth ordinary session, held at Kampala from 28 July to 1 August 1975, which considered "that the racist regime in occupied Palestine and the racist regime in Zimbabwe and South Africa have a common imperialist origin, forming a whole and having the same racist structure and being organically linked in their policy aimed at repression of the dignity and integrity of the human being",
Taking note also of the Political Declaration and Strategy to Strengthen International Peace and Security and to Intensify Solidarity and Mutual Assistance among Non-Aligned Countries, adopted at the Conference of Ministers for Foreign Affairs of Non-Aligned Countries held at Lima from 25 to 30 August 1975, which most severely condemned zionism as a threat to world peace and security and called upon all countries to oppose this racist and imperialist ideology,
Determines that Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination.
In his address to the United Nations General Assembly the same day, 10 November 1975, Israeli Ambassador Chaim Herzog stated: [9]
"I can point with pride to the Arab ministers who have served in my government; to the Arab deputy speaker of my Parliament; to Arab officers and men serving of their own volition in our border and police defense forces, frequently commanding Jewish troops; to the hundreds of thousands of Arabs from all over the Middle East crowding the cities of Israel every year; to the thousands of Arabs from all over the Middle East coming for medical treatment to Israel; to the peaceful coexistence which has developed; to the fact that Arabic is an official language in Israel on a par with Hebrew; to the fact that it is as natural for an Arab to serve in public office in Israel as it is incongruous to think of a Jew serving in any public office in an Arab country, indeed being admitted to many of them. Is that racism? It is not! That ... is Zionism."
Herzog ended his statement, while holding a copy of the resolution, with these words:
"For us, the Jewish people, this resolution based on hatred, falsehood and arrogance, is devoid of any moral or legal value. For us, the Jewish people, this is no more than a piece of paper and we shall treat it as such."
As he concluded his speech, Herzog tore the resolution in half.
The name of the "UN Avenue" in Haifa, Jerusalem and Tel Aviv was switched to the "Zionism Avenue" as a response to the UN's decision. [10]
Before the vote, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the United States ambassador to the United Nations, warned that, "The United Nations is about to make anti-Semitism international law." [11] He delivered a speech against the resolution, including the famous line, "[The United States] does not acknowledge, it will not abide by, it will never acquiesce in this infamous act ... A great evil has been loosed upon the world." [12]
In Campbell, California, in the United States, a group of high school students attempted to solicit signatures on the premises of a local shopping center for a petition against Resolution 3379. The result was the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision in Pruneyard Shopping Center v. Robins (1980) that supported states' rights to expand the exercise of free speech, which California held was legal in what were considered public areas of a shopping mall. [13]
Mexico's vote in favor of the resolution led some United States Jews to organize a tourism boycott of Mexico. This ended after Mexican foreign minister Emilio Óscar Rabasa made a trip to Israel (Rabasa shortly afterward was forced to resign). [14] [15]
| UN General Assembly Resolution 46/86 | |
|---|---|
| Date | 16 December 1991 |
| Meeting no. | 74 |
| Code | A/RES/46/86 (Document) |
| Subject | Elimination of racism and racial discrimination |
Voting summary |
|
| Result | Adopted |
United Nations General Assembly Resolution 46/86, adopted on 16 December 1991, revoked Resolution 3379's designation of Zionism as a form of racism and racial discrimination. [1] Israel had made the revocation a condition for its participation in the Madrid Conference of 1991. [16] The vote on Resolution 46/86 was held shortly after the Gulf War with sponsorship by 88 countries, including the overwhelming majority of both the First World and the Second World, and was chiefly supported by many African countries. The Arab League, most Muslim-majority countries, and four other countries (Cuba, North Korea, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam) voted against it.
In total, the motion to revoke Resolution 3379 received 111 votes in favour, 25 votes against, and 13 abstentions.
Resolution 46/86 was raised under pressure from the United States, [17] and American president George H. W. Bush personally introduced the motion to revoke Resolution 3379 with the following statement:
UNGA Resolution 3379, the so-called "Zionism is racism" resolution, mocks this pledge and the principles upon which the United Nations was founded. And I call now for its repeal. Zionism is not a policy; it is the idea that led to the creation of a home for the Jewish people, to the State of Israel. And to equate Zionism with the intolerable sin of racism is to twist history and forget the terrible plight of Jews in World War II and, indeed, throughout history. To equate Zionism with racism is to reject Israel itself, a member of good standing of the United Nations. This body cannot claim to seek peace and at the same time challenge Israel's right to exist. By repealing this resolution unconditionally, the United Nations will enhance its credibility and serve the cause of peace. [17]
The full text of the revocation was simply: [18] [19]
"The General Assembly decides to revoke the determination contained in its resolution 3379 (XXX) of 10 November 1975."
| In favour (111) 88 states sponsoring | Abstaining (13) | Against (25) | Absent (15) | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|  Angola  Burkina Faso  Ethiopia  Ghana  Laos  Maldives  Mauritius  Myanmar  Trinidad and Tobago  Turkey  Uganda  Tanzania  Zimbabwe |  Afghanistan  Algeria  Brunei  Bangladesh  Cuba  North Korea  Indonesia  Iran  Iraq  Jordan  Lebanon  Libya  Malaysia  Mali  Mauritania  Pakistan  Qatar  Saudi Arabia  Somalia  Sri Lanka  Sudan  Syrian Arab Republic  United Arab Emirates  Vietnam  Yemen |  Bahrain  Chad  China  Comoros  Djibouti  Egypt  Guinea  Guinea-Bissau  Kuwait  Morocco  Niger  Oman  Senegal  South Africa  Tunisia  Vanuatu | ||
| Source: United Nations Bibliographic Information System [20] | |||||
Zionism is a nationalist movement that emerged in the 19th century to enable the establishment of a homeland for the Jewish people in Palestine, a region roughly corresponding to the Land of Israel in Jewish tradition. Following the establishment of the modern state of Israel, Zionism became an ideology that supports the development and protection of the State of Israel as a Jewish state.
The World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) is a series of international events organized by UNESCO to promote struggle against racism ideologies and behaviours. Five conferences have been held so far, in 1978, 1983, 2001, 2009 and 2021. Founded after World War II and the Holocaust as a dependent body of the United Nations, UNESCO started as soon as it was created to promote scientific studies concerning ethnic groups and their diffusion in public opinion to dispel pseudo-scientific rationalizations of racism. One of its first published works was The Race Question in 1950, signed by various internationally renowned scholars.
A United Nations General Assembly resolution is a decision or declaration voted on by all member states of the United Nations in the General Assembly.
The United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine was a proposal by the United Nations, which recommended a partition of Mandatory Palestine at the end of the British Mandate. On 29 November 1947, the UN General Assembly adopted the Plan as Resolution 181 (II).
A homeland for the Jewish people is an idea rooted in Jewish history, religion, and culture. The Jewish aspiration to return to Zion, generally associated with divine redemption, has suffused Jewish religious thought since the destruction of the First Temple and the Babylonian exile.
Major-General Chaim Herzog was an Israeli politician, general, lawyer and author who served as the sixth President of Israel between 1983 and 1993. Born in Belfast and raised primarily in Dublin, the son of Ireland's Chief Rabbi Yitzhak HaLevi Herzog, he immigrated to Mandatory Palestine in 1935 and served in the Haganah Jewish paramilitary group during the 1936–1939 Arab revolt. He returned to Palestine after the war and, following the end of the British Mandate and Israel's Declaration of Independence in 1948, fought in the Battles of Latrun during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. He retired from the Israel Defence Forces in 1962 with the rank of major-general.
Issues relating to the State of Israel and aspects of the Arab–Israeli conflict and more recently the Iran–Israel conflict occupy repeated annual debate times, resolutions and resources at the United Nations. Since its founding in 1948, the United Nations Security Council, has adopted 79 resolutions directly related to the Arab–Israeli conflict as of January 2010.
Soviet anti-Zionism is an anti-Zionist and pro-Arab doctrine promulgated in the Soviet Union during the Cold War. While the Soviet Union initially pursued a pro-Zionist policy after World War II due to its perception that the Jewish state would be socialist and pro-Soviet, its outlook on the Arab–Israeli conflict changed as Israel began to develop a close relationship with the United States and aligned itself with the Western Bloc. Anti-Israel Soviet propaganda intensified after Israel's sweeping victory in the 1967 Arab–Israeli War, and it was officially sponsored by the agitation and propaganda media of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union as well as by the KGB. Among other charges, it alleged that Zionism was a form of racism. The Soviets framed their anti-Zionist propaganda in the guise of a study of modern Zionism, dubbed Zionology. The Soviet anti-Israel policy included the regulated denial of permission for Jews in the Soviet Union to emigrate, primarily to Israel, but also to any other country.
The Women's International Zionist Organization is a volunteer organization dedicated to social welfare in all sectors of Israeli society, the advancement of the status of women, and Jewish education in Israel and the Diaspora.
The 2001 World Conference against Racism (WCAR), also known as Durban I, was held at the Durban International Convention Centre in Durban, South Africa, under UN auspices, from 31 August to 8 September 2001.
The United Nations Decade for Women was a period from 1975 to 1985 focused on the policies and issues that impact women, such as pay equity, gendered violence, land holding, and other human rights. It was adopted December 15, 1975, by the United Nations General Assembly by Resolution 31/136.
In world politics, Jewish state is a characterization of Israel as the nation-state and sovereign homeland of the Jewish people.
Emilio Óscar Rabasa Mishkin (23 January 1925 – 14 June 2008) was a Mexican politician, diplomat and academic.
Anti-Zionism is opposition to Zionism. Although anti-Zionism is a heterogeneous phenomenon, all its proponents agree that the creation of the modern State of Israel, and the movement to create a sovereign Jewish state in the region of Palestine—a region partly coinciding with the biblical Land of Israel—was flawed or unjust in some way. Anti-Zionism includes, for example, criticism of the current policies of the state of Israel as well as moral, ethical, or religious criticism of the idea of a Jewish nation-state, in contrast to a secular state.
The United Nations has been criticized for a variety of reasons, including its policies, ideology, equality of representation, administration, ability to enforce rulings, and ideological bias.
Events in the year 1991 in Israel.
The alliance between Algeria and Palestine is strong and enduring. Algeria is a supporter of the Middle East peace process and it has no diplomatic relations with Israel.
The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD) is a United Nations convention. A third-generation human rights instrument, the Convention commits its members to the elimination of racial discrimination and the promotion of understanding among all races. The Convention also requires its parties to criminalize hate speech and criminalize membership in racist organizations.
Declaration of Mexico on the Equality of Women and their Contribution to Development and Peace 66/34 was a United Nations resolution that was adopted on July 2, 1975, at the close of the International Women's Year World Conference on Women held in Mexico City. The resolution was adopted to promulgate a set of principles concerning the equality of men and women. The Declaration called for action to immediately address the burdens and discrimination women experienced in the labor market, as primary childcare providers, and as political participants around the world.
Fayez Sayigh (1922–1980) was a Arab-American diplomat, scholar and teacher. He was one of the most significant scholars who developed various analyses on the Palestinian resistance movement against Zionism.
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