Far-right Israel clashes at UN, Americans react with antipathy over ‘no shared values’
As public opinion in the United States grew to avoid extreme right-wing Israel, negative reactions to “sharing values” grew, and the United Nations committee decided to designate prehistoric ruins near Jericho, an ancient city on the West Bank, as a World Cultural Heritage Site in Palestine.
In a poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, four in 10 Americans said Israel is a U.S. partner but “Israel does not share U.S. interests and values.”
The poll found that only 3 in 10 say Israel is an ally with shared U.S. interests, and conservative Republicans (44%) are more likely than Democrats (25%) to call Israel an ally with shared values. 2 out of 10 Americans expressed antipathy toward Israel, describing it as a “rival or enemy” of the United States.
Regarding the new poll conducted as U.S. President Biden prepares to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York this week on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, the AP said, "Americans generally view Israel as a partner or ally, but many do not support Israel's far-right government." “It raises questions about whether they share American values,” he said, reporting on negative public opinion in the United States toward the far-right government.
Israel has recently intensified its criticism of the UN-led vote on listing the ruins near ancient Jericho as a World Heritage Site in Palestine.
A UN committee has taken control of the territory by voting to designate prehistoric ruins near the ancient city of Jericho in the West Bank as a World Heritage site for Palestine, clashing with Israel, which has not yet recognized the state of Palestine.
Jericho is one of the oldest inhabited cities on Earth, located in the part of the Israeli-occupied West Bank administered by the internationally recognized Palestinian Authority, with prehistoric ruins dating to the 9th century BC and a nearby area outside the ancient city. There is an archaeological site of Tell es-Sultan.
The decision was made at a meeting of the United Nations World Heritage Committee held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, under the auspices of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement, "It is a cynical ploy by the Palestinians to politicize UNESCO," and added, "Israel will work with its allies to overturn the organization's 'distorted' decision." Public opinion in the United States has a negative view of the far-right government. appeared.
Opinion polls show that most Americans say Israel is a partner but do not share American values.
Israel withdrew from UNESCO in 2019, accusing it of being biased and undermining links to the Holy Site.
On the other hand, Israel opposed UNESCO's recognition of Palestine as a member state in 2011.
However, Israel remains a party to the World Heritage Convention and sent a delegation to the Riyadh conference.
Far-right Prime Minister Netanyahu announced that during his visit to the United States, he would go to California to talk with Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Mana X (formerly Twitter) about anti-Semitism in artificial intelligence.
On the 18th, counter-protesters gathered outside Tesla's Fremont, California factory where it makes electric vehicles and unfurled 'anti-Israel' banners.
Elon Musk is being accused of tolerating anti-Semitic messages at X.
The Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil rights group, accused Musk of allowing anti-Semitism and hate speech to spread on the platform.
Director Jonathan Greenblatt said Musk had recently "amplified" the messages of neo-Nazis and white supremacists seeking to ban the league from X.
Israel's Netanahu government has formalized a proposal to bring Musk's Tesla factory to Israel.
Netanyahu's government has cracked down on nine months of protests by hundreds of thousands of Israelis against Netanyahu's far-right plan to overhaul Israel's judicial system.
These far-right protests spread abroad, with groups of Israeli expatriates demonstrating during visits by Netanyahu and other members of his cabinet.
Prime Minister Netanyahu is scheduled to head from California to New York to address the United Nations General Assembly and meet with President Biden.
Russia and China will not attend the UN General Assembly, but German Chancellor Scholz, Turkish President Erdogan, Ukrainian President Zelensky, and President Yoon Seok-yeol will attend.
Prime Minister Netanyahu has pushed for judicial reform to control the power of far-right, unelected judges.
His extreme liberal tendencies were criticized as ‘interventionism’ due to judicial reform and control of judges.
The AP said critics said Netanyahu's plan was "a power grab that would destroy the country's system of checks and balances and push it toward dictatorial rule."
In a clash of international opinion against Israel, which dominates international media, leading figures in the newly influential high-tech community have taken on an increased role in the protests.
International public opinion responded to the neo-far-right ideology by saying, “Weakening the judiciary will harm the country’s business environment and drive out foreign investment.”
Due to the extreme right-wing shift in Israel, the Israeli currency, the shekel, has plummeted in value this year in a sign of weakening foreign investment.
The Wall Street Journal reported on the 18th, citing an informed source, that Saudi Arabia proposed a condition to give Tesla the right to purchase a certain amount of metals and minerals needed for electric vehicles in countries including the Democratic Republic of the Congo in order to establish a manufacturing plant in Saudi Arabia.
Turkish President Erdogan, who attended the UN General Assembly just before this, asked Tesla CEO Musk to build an automobile factory in Turkey, and just a few hours later, construction of a Tesla factory in Saudi Arabia was announced.
With the absence of four permanent members of the UN General Assembly (only the United States attended), the growing demands of countries in the ‘Global South’, an informal group of developing and underdeveloped countries, came to dominate.“
We will come together at a time when humanity faces enormous challenges, from the worsening climate emergency to escalating conflicts, the global cost-of-living crisis, soaring inequality and dramatic technological disruption,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said at a briefing last week.
The New York Times reported that at the UN General Assembly, “the UN Secretary-General acknowledged that it is becoming increasingly difficult to bring UN member states together given the depth of division revealed by the absence of world leaders.”