The United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) chamber. in New York City. Photo: MusikAnimal via Wikimedia Commons.

A watchdog group has slammed members of the UN’s Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) for “hijacking” the body to push an anti-Israel agenda.

Commenting on an ECOSOC meeting that took place earlier this week, which included a 43-3 vote (with eight abstentions) castigating Israel for supposed violations of women’s rights, Hillel Neuer — executive director of the Geneva-based NGO UN Watch — said, “ECOSOC’s 2020 session completely ignored the world’s worst abusers of women’s rights, refusing to pass a single resolution on the situation of women in Yemen, Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, DR Congo, Iran, Chad or Saudi Arabia, all of which ranked in the top ten worst countries in the 2020 Global Gender Gap Report, produced by the World Economic Forum.”

“At a time when Iran is imprisoning women’s rights activists like Nasrin Sotudeh and Narges Mohammedi, Saudi Arabia is imprisoning and torturing numerous women’s rights activists, Pakistan has the highest number of documented and estimated honor killings per capita of any country in the world, and Belarus is beating women protesters in the streets, it is the theater of the absurd for these misogynistic regimes to be singling out Israel — alone in the world — as an alleged violator of women’s rights,” Neuer continued.

“We are also disappointed in other countries which joined the jackals in scapegoating the Jewish state, including France, Spain, Ireland, Japan, Latvia, Luxembourg, Mexico, Norway and Uruguay,” he added.

The resolution accused Israel of posing a “major obstacle” for Palestinian women “with regard to the fulfillment of their rights, and their advancement, self-reliance and integration in the development of their society.”

The vote on the resolution broke down as follows:

43 YES: Angola, Armenia, Bangladesh, Belarus, Benin, Botswana, China, Colombia, Congo, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Finland, France, Gabon, Ghana, India, Iran (Islamic Republic of), Ireland, Japan, Kenya, Latvia, Luxembourg, Malawi, Mali, Malta, Mexico, Morocco, Nicaragua, Norway, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Philippines, Republic of Korea, Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Sudan, Thailand, Turkmenistan, Uruguay

3 NO: United States, Canada, Australia

8 ABSTAIN: Brazil, Germany, Jamaica, Montenegro, Netherlands, Switzerland, Togo, Ukraine