An exhibit titled “Memories” commemorating terror victims at the United Nations in New York in 2024. Photo courtesy of the United Nations Visitors Centre.
When the United Nations marks International Day of Remembrance and Tribute to Victims of Terrorism on Wednesday, August 21, it will treat some victims as more equal than others, according to Gilad Erdan, the outgoing Israeli ambassador to the United Nations. The Israeli envoy posted a video walkthrough—in Hebrew with English subtitles—of an exhibit about global terror victims at U.N. headquarters in New York, in a place where all visitors enter the building.
Guess What Is Missing?
There are mentions of the Sept. 11 terror attacks in 2001 and the Boston Marathon bombing in 2013, as well as references to terror in Indonesia and Kenya. “But what’s missing?” Erdan asked.
“There’s not a single mention of any attack carried out by Palestinians against Israelis,” he said. “We are about to mark one year since the massacre and the largest terrorist attack against Jews and Israelis since the Holocaust. Yet the U.N. doesn’t think it needs to be displayed on its walls.”
There is a display of a “Palestinian victim,” which the U.N. exhibit identifies as occurring in “Palestine,” Erdan noted, “so that people might think she was harmed in Israel, but when you read the fine print, it turns out she was actually injured in an attack in New Zealand.”
The exhibit “Memories,” which is on view until Aug. 27, “aims to raise awareness about the human stories that lie at the heart of each victim and survivor of terrorism, as well as the long-lasting impact each terrorist attack has on its surviving victims,” per the U.N. website.
“It also seeks to highlight the commonalities that connect victims across the world and to emphasize the importance of preventing terrorist attacks and the emergence of new victims,” it adds. “It is in connection with the International Day of Remembrance and Tribute to the Victims of Terrorism (Aug. 21).”
The Global Victims of Terrorism Support Programme of the Counter-Terrorism Center of the U.N. Office of Counter-Terrorism organized the show, which the U.N. Office of Counter-Terrorism also endorsed, according to the U.N. website.
“There is no place more corrupt and morally twisted than the U.N., and we must all unite to spread this message worldwide, demanding the closure and the dismantling of this organization, and the establishment of a new body that truly represents noble values,” the ambassador said.
