New York, December 6th, 2021 – This week the European Coalition for Israel is finally returning to the United Nations in New York after a pause of almost two years due to the COVID-19 pandemic during which all meetings and activities have been conducted virtually.

“We see certain movements in the right direction both at the UN and the EU although the progress is slow,” ECI Founding Director Tomas Sandell said on Monday. Whereas many critics have slammed the United Nations for once again adopting a resolution which denies any Jewish connections to the Temple Mount, a total of 19 nations changed sides by abstaining instead of supporting the resolution, among them many of the EU member states. Hungary and Czech opposed the resolution while Austria, Denmark, Germany, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia abstained. Also the UK moved their vote from yes to abstention.

“Whenever referring to the Temple Mount / al Haram al Sharif in the Jerusalem resolution, both terms should be used,” an EU representative said.

“This UN resolution is a flagrant violation of historical facts and international law. Denying any Jewish links to the Temple mount is a dangerous form of historical revisionism which is fuelling antisemitism,” Sandell warned.

In multiple meetings at the UN this week ECI, through its UN initiative, Forum for Cultural Diplomacy, will continue to raise this issue with the UN missions while at the same time present concrete measures in which UN member states can build support for the Jewish state.

Last week a delegation from ECI made a similar working visit to the European Union in Brussels where they had meetings both at the European Commission and with the new Israeli ambassador to the EU Haim Regev who acknowledged that EU-Israeli relations are warming up.
“Although clear differences remain the overall trend is towards closer relations,” the ambassador said.

In the first European Report talk show recorded in the studio of the European Parliament in almost two years, Austrian MEP Lukas Mandl commended his own government for clearly taking a stand for Israel while Israeli citizens were being attacked by terrorist organisation Hamas earlier in the year.
“Standing up for the only Jewish state in the world is also a stand against rising antisemitism”, he said in the program which also featured EU Coordinator in the combat against antisemitism, Katharina von Schnurbein who warned against resurging conspiracy theories which blame Jews for the COVID-pandemic.

Replying to a direct question about the trend of wearing a yellow Jewish star in demonstrations against vaccinations she refuted the comparison to the persecution of Jews during the Nazi times as absurd.
“This is simple a new kind of Holocaust trivialization and needs to be called out as such,” she said.

After a travel stop for almost sixteen months ECI resumed international travel in August and have since visited London, Paris, Brussels, Rome, Jerusalem and Berlin before making a first working visiting to New York this week. For a more comprehensive report on these and other activities please subscribe to our Monthly newsletter.