Samantha Power’s
Failure to Stop Genocide at the UN
by Shmuley Boteach 23 Nov 2016
Elie Wiesel served
as chairman of the President’s Commission on the Holocaust and was a guiding
force in the establishment of the United States
Holocaust Museum, so it is only fitting that the museum honor him with a
memorial lecture, which it plans to do on November 30.
Wiesel, whom I was pleased to call a mentor and friend,
was the last giant among Jewish leaders, and a source of inspiration to all of
humanity who spoke out whenever the rest of the world silently watched their
brothers and sisters slaughtered by terrorists or genocidal maniacs.
He was not afraid of speaking truth to power. He stood
beside President Ronald Reagan and told him that it was a mistake to visit the
German cemetery at Bitburg where Nazis were buried. ”That place, Mr. President,
is not your place,” Wiesel told the president at White House ceremonies
honoring the writer. ”Your place is with the victims of the SS.”
When President Bill Clinton originally stood by while the
people of Bosnia were slaughtered, as he would later do in Rwanda,
Wiesel called him out for his inaction. “Mr. President … I have been in
the former Yugoslavia last fall. I cannot sleep since for what I have seen. As
a Jew I am saying that we must do something to stop the bloodshed in that
country! People fight each other and children die. Why? Something, anything
must be done.” The occasion was the opening of the United States Holocaust
Museum in Washington on April 22, 1993.
The person who reminds us that Weisel rebuked
an American president for inaction was UN Ambassador Samantha Power in her 2002 Pulitzer-Prize winning book, A
Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide.
Power made her reputation in the world of human
rights by following in Weisel’s footsteps and criticizing bystanders to the
genocide in places such as Rwanda. That is why I was honored to stand by her
when she was nominated to be Ambassador to the UN.
Today, I feel a personal responsibility to make this
point: Samantha Power’s failure to stop genocide while in office renders her
the wrong person to deliver the Elie Wiesel Memorial Lecture.
Power did not condemn Iran for its repeated
genocidal threats against Israel, did not recognize the Armenian Genocide
on its centenary, and remained in an administration that did not lift a finger
to stop gassing of children in Syria.
Her inaction in the face of appalling mass slaughter
is incongruent with her life’s work of exposing those who did nothing while
innocents were murdered. For so many years, as a journalist and academic, she
did not have the power to stop the genocide she witnessed. She could only
criticize the inaction of others.
That was all supposed to change when Power joined the
government. Now, she appears in danger of going out of office as one of
the bystanders she vociferously denounced.
I understand that she does not make policy, and that as a
member of the administration she is responsible for carrying out the wishes of
the president. Nevertheless, her actions are inexcusable.
Throughout her tenure as UN Ambassador, Iranian leaderss
have threatened to destroy Israel. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said in 2015:
“God willing, there will not be something named the Zionist regime in the next
25 years.” A few weeks earlier, he said, “Israel will grow less safe day by day
whether there is a nuclear deal or not. Bear this in mind that Israel will
never be secure…”.
The Commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard was even more
explicit in August 2015, when he declared: “We shall proceed with the jihad,
resistance and martyrdom until Jerusalem is liberated and the Zionist regime,
that stigma among Islamic peoples, is erased.”
Through all these declarations, Power, along with
Secretary of State John Kerry, was in negotiations with Iran without a single
public demand that they stop promising a second Holocaust.
The Iranian incitement to genocide is in direct violation
of the UN’s own 1948 anti-genocide
convention. Still, Power remained silent. Perhaps she believed that
President Barack Obama’s deal was actually good for Israel. Still, she could
have given one speech at the Security Council demanding that Iran stop
promising to kill all the Jews.
She did not.
Beyond supporting the deal, Power has further made
excuses for Iran’s ballistic missile tests and violations of the nuclear
agreement. Even as evidence of Iran’s cheating have been publicized, Power has
claimed its compliance has been “strong.” When the International Atomic Energy
Agency accused Iran of violating the agreement in its latest report, Power was
silent as her State Department gave an Orwellian explanation to suggest
Iran’s behavior was not problematic.
Power has not forcefully raised her voice while
people are being murdered every day in the Middle East and North Africa.
Shiites and Sunnis kill each other on a daily basis throughout the Middle East
while thousands die in Sudan, Nigeria, Libya and Yemen. Christian communities
that have existed for centuries in the Middle East are being decimated as many
men, women and children are killed or forced to flee. This legacy is unworthy
of The United States Holocaust Museum’s tribute to Elie Wiesel, the face of the
martyred six million.
The World Policy Institute
declared that Syria’s civil war has become a genocide, conducted by the
Assad regime, and backed by Iran and Russia. Hundreds of thousands of Syrians
have died and become refugees. After Assad used chemical weapons against his
own people President Obama did nothing, even after promising action for
crossing a “red line.” The plan Obama trumpeted to remove all chemical weapons
from Syria was a failure and the stockpile retained by Assad continues to be
used on civilian population with impunity.
Nearly 400,000 innocent Arab men, women, and children
have by now been murdered in Syria. The United States has refused even to
implement a no-fly zone so that children cannot be slaughtered from the air.
Through all this, Power has stayed loyal to the administration amidst its
inaction.
When Power campaigned with then-Senator Obama in
2008, she promised that he would not lie to the Armenians and would
recognize the Armenian Genocide. On the one-hundredth anniversary of the
Armenian Genocide, however, she and Obama were silent, toeing the politically
convenient and historically inaccurate line that Turkey did not wage a
genocidal war against the Armenians in order to placate the Turkish leader
Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Public officials can only be trusted to stop genocides
today if they have the courage to recognize those of the past. Is it any wonder
that the Turks now feel emboldened to take the first steps toward the potential
mass murder of the Kurds?
When she leaves office, Power will face the all-important
question: “Why didn’t you take action when you had the power to do so?”
Power is not the first government official to face
the conflict of conscience versus duty, or morality versus political loyalty.
She could have spoken up for the victims, and if President Obama respected her
as a defender of human rights, he would have allowed her to speak out and
listened to her admonition to take action.
In the past she criticized officials who turned a blind
eye to genocide out of political expediency, and praised others who did stand
on conscience — such as Marshall Harris, who resigned in protest over the
Clinton administration’s failure to take action to stop the genocide in Bosnia.
She should have followed Harris’ example on the Iran deal and Syria.
The US Holocaust Memorial Museum is one of the country’s
most important and respected institutions. Every time I visit, I feel like I am
in a sacred space. Elie Wiesel came to embody the memory of the Holocaust.
He deserves to be eulogized by those who do not just
preach his gospel, but follow in his footsteps.
Samantha Power should publicly condemn the despicable
government of Iran for daring to even threaten a second Holocaust. And she
should reach out to the Armenian community and tell them that as a member of Obama’s
cabinet, she publicly acknowledges the genocide they experienced at the hands
of the Ottoman Turks.
Only then will she be worthy of Elie Wiesel.
And if she feels uncomfortable, in the last few weeks of
her ambassadorship, speaking truth to power, then Power should consider
doing the right thing by removing herself from the Elie Wiesel Memorial Lecture
and allowing someone else to take her place.
United States Holocaust Museum
Elie
Wiesel was a member of the United
States Holocaust Memorial Council, an overseer at the International Rescue Committee, and a messenger of peace for the United Nations.
Note: Foundation
to Promote Open Society was a funder for the International Rescue Committee, the Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace (think tank), the Human
Rights Watch, the Natural Resources
Defense Council, and the Climate
Reality Project.
George
Soros was the chairman for the Foundation
to Promote Open Society, a benefactor for the Human Rights Watch, and is a board member for the International Crisis Group.
Samantha Power
was a board member for the International
Crisis Group, a director at the International
Rescue Committee, and is the U.S. ambassador for the United Nations.
Jessica Tuchman Mathews was a board member for
the International Crisis Group, the
president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (think tank),
the VP for the World Resources Institute
(think tank), is a director at the American Friends of Bilderberg
(think tank), and a 2008 Bilderberg conference participant (think tank).
Ed Griffin’s interview with
Norman Dodd in 1982
(The investigation into the
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace uncovered the plans for population
control by involving the United States in war)
Ngozi
Okonjo-Iweala was a director at the World
Resources Institute, and is a director at the ONE Campaign.
Michelle Obama
was an advocate for the ONE Campaign,
and a lawyer at Sidley Austin LLP.
Sidley Austin
LLP is the lobby firm for Israel.
International
Rescue Committee is a partner with the ONE
Campaign.
Elie
Wiesel was an overseer at the International
Rescue Committee, a messenger of peace for the United Nations, and a member of the United States Holocaust Memorial Council.
Michael J. Gerson
was a director at the International
Rescue Committee, and a member of the United
States Holocaust Memorial Council.
Joshua B. Bolten is
a member of the United States Holocaust
Memorial Council, and a director at the ONE Campaign.
International
Rescue Committee is a partner with the ONE
Campaign.
Samantha Power
was a director at the International
Rescue Committee, a board member for the International Crisis Group, and is the U.S. ambassador for the United Nations.
Bradley D. Wine
is a member of the United States Holocaust Memorial Council,
and a director at the Genocide
Intervention Network.
Joan R. Platt was
a director at the Genocide Intervention
Network, and is a director at the Human
Rights Watch.
Foundation
to Promote Open Society was a funder for the Human Rights Watch, the International
Rescue Committee, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (think
tank), the Natural Resources Defense
Council, and the Climate Reality
Project.
George
Soros was the chairman for the Foundation
to Promote Open Society, a benefactor for the Human Rights Watch, and is a board member for the International Crisis Group.
Samantha Power
was a board member for the International
Crisis Group, a director at the International
Rescue Committee, and is the U.S. ambassador for the United Nations.
Adrian W. DeWind
was a co-founder for
the Human Rights Watch, and a trustee
at the Natural Resources Defense Council.
James Gustave
Speth is an honorary trustee at the Natural
Resources Defense Council, a director at the World Resources Institute (think tank), and a director at the Climate Reality Project.
Albert A. Gore Jr.
was a director at the World Resources
Institute (think tank), is the chairman for the Climate Reality Project, and a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.
Colin L. Powell is
a strategic adviser at Kleiner Perkins
Caufield & Byers, and an overseer at the International Rescue Committee.
International
Rescue Committee is a partner with the ONE
Campaign.
Samantha Power
was a director at the International
Rescue Committee, a board member for the International Crisis Group, and is the U.S. ambassador for the United Nations.
Michael J. Gerson
was a director at the International
Rescue Committee, and a member of the United
States Holocaust Memorial Council.
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