On Racism and Zionism

THE UNITED NATIONS' Social, Economic and Humanitarian Committee resolution condemning Zionism as a form of racism brings shame to an organization created in the wake of the defeat of fascism to ensure that the horrors of that era can never be repeated.

Had the resolution been accepted in its original form, as a proposal by several African states to condemn apartheid and proclaim a "Decade for the Elimination of Racism," the United Nations might have been commended for achieving a long-sought goal. But the inclusion of the amendment defining Zionism as racism and its passage by an overwhelming majority of member states, not only defames the United Nations' name; as black leaders and church groups in this country have pointed out, it also hampers the U.N.'s ability to pursue its worthwhile goal of eradicating true racism throughout the world.

What are the implications of the anti-Zionist resolution? Zionism is the national liberation movement of the Jewish people. The Zionist movement asserts the right of that people to determine their destiny in Israel, their homeland. By equating Zionism and racial discrimination, the United Nations denies the right of national sovereignty to one particular people, the Jews, thus subverting their own principles and perpetuating the very practice it purports to condemn. Morever, the United Nations' attempt to deal with the Arab-Israeli conflict through linguistic obfuscation limits its capacity to reconcile the claims of the two vying national liberation movements in the Middle East--the Jewish and Palestinian--such a task would be more difficult, but significantly more meaningful than the U.N.'s current verbal antics.

Although the United Nations' recent rhetorical pronouncement deserves the censure it has inspired, it is fortunate that the resolution is just that--rhetoric. The U.N. showed that it can advance a people's fight for national liberation when it called for the establishment of the Israeli state in 1947. Israel's continued existence demonstrates that the U.N. cannot thwart that same struggle. Whatever the United Nations says or does the State of Israel will survive as the expression of the right of the Jewish people to national self-determination.