United Nations diplomats from 35 nations came together at the U.N. headquarters in New York last Thursday to mark the upcoming Jewish holiday of Passover and draw inspiration from its universal message of freedom from slavery.
The European Coalition for Israel luncheon took place in conjunction with the international day of remembrance of the victims of slavery and the transatlantic slave trade.
During the luncheon, I reminded the audience about how the San Remo resolution of 1920, promising the reconstitution of a Jewish national home in Palestine, is considered to be the start of the decolonization process as it proved that a people that had been under foreign occupation for over 1,800 years could regain independence.
In his speech Ambassador Isiah Chabala, former permanent representative of Zambia to the U.N., shared how the Jewish struggle for freedom from slavery and occupation has inspired many African nations in their own quest for freedom and national independence.
American Jewish Committee Executive Director David Harris reminded the audience about how American civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. drew much of his inspiration from the story of Moses and how two decades later the call to “let my people go” lead to the modern exodus of more than one million Jews from the former Soviet Union.
“This proves that the story of Passover is not only a message from the past but a contemporary one,” Harris said said.
In a personally written message for the luncheon, Albanian President H.E Bujar Nishani explained the relevance of Passover for his own country, where breaking free from Egyptian slavery meant leaving behind anti-Semitism, racism, chauvinism, communism, persecution, totalitarianism and terrorism. In December, President Nishani hosted ECI at his own presidential Hanukkah event at the presidential palace in Tirana, thus illustrating his commitment to the universal values of the Jewish holidays.
Ambassador Ron Prosor, Israeli permanent representative to the U.N., quoted 19th-century German poet Heinrich Heine in stating, “since the Exodus, freedom has always been spoken with a Hebrew accent.”
Prosor also noted that the Jewish experience is a freedom can never be taken for granted. Commenting on the crucial last phase in the nuclear weapons negotiations with Iran, he drew parallels to the Passover story of the four sons—one wise, one wicked, one simple and one who does not know how to ask a question. Naming Iran as “the wicked son” who is trying to wipe Israel off the map, Prosor went on to name those countries that are negotiating with Iran as “the son who does not know how to ask the right questions” and refuses to acknowledge the threat that Iran poses to Israel and the international community as a whole.
This was the second ECI luncheon to mark a Jewish holiday at the U.N. In September, ECI hosted a similar luncheon event in preparation of the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur to learn about the values of forgiveness and reconciliation in international relations.
The Jewish holiday of Passover commences on Friday, April 3rd and ends Saturday April 11th.
Tomas Sandell is the director of the European Coalition for Israel.
