April 23, 2009

Iran’s clownish President Ahmadinejad surprised no one by taking the opportunity of an international platform — on Yom Hashoa, no less — to ridicule Israel as a “racist” state and heap scorn on the legacy of the Holocaust and its victims. Nor was it a surprise that a UN conference on racism sponsored in large part by Libya, Iran, Egypt, Cuba, and Pakistan would devolve into yet another exercise in Israel-bashing and reaffirm a 2001 declaration notable for its endorsement of a message like Ahmadinejad’s and an effort to criminalize criticism of Islam.

But the ugly events at the “Durban II” conference in Geneva shouldn’t detract from the positive news. First and foremost was the United States’ boycott of the conference, which demonstrated to the world the intellectual and moral bankruptcy of the conference organizers. Similarly, the European representatives who walked out en masse during Ahmadinejad’s tirade sent a clear message, to their own people most of all, that hate speech has no place in political debate.

The conference also demonstrated the power of a good defense. Israel and its supporters succeeded in getting a number of countries to boycott the conference, from Australia and New Zealand to Italy and the Czech Republic. And pro-Israel groups put pressure on past conference funders, including the Ford Foundation and the Canadian government, to curtail their contributions. Activists took to the streets of Geneva to counter what turned out to be meager displays of anti-Israel street theater. The result, as JTA reported, was that “Durban II would not be a reprise of Durban I.”

Of course, these are just battles in a long war. And deft diplomacy doesn’t change the fact that Iran retains nuclear ambitions to match its president’s bellicosity. Israel and the world will need to remain vigilant and continue the full court press that will prevent harsh words from becoming deadly deeds.

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