From The Times of Israel:
69 years after joining, Israel formally leaves UNESCO; so, too, does the US
As the new year began, Israel officially left the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, despite recent efforts by the agency’s head to combat its politicization and alleged anti-Israel bias.
The withdrawal went into effect at midnight Paris time (1 a.m. in Israel). The US departure also took effect at the same time.
“UNESCO is a body that continually rewrites history, including by erasing the Jewish connection to Jerusalem,” Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon told The Times of Israel on Monday.
“It is corrupted and manipulated by Israel’s enemies, and continually singles out the only Jewish state for condemnation. We are not going to be a member of an organization that deliberately acts against us.”
In October 2017, mere days after the US administration announced its withdrawal from UNESCO due to, among other things, its alleged obsession with Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that he was following the US lead.
“We hope that the organization will change its ways but we are not pinning hopes on this; therefore, my directive to leave the organization stands and we will mo
Fantastic move for both the United States and for Israel. UNESCO was first considered in 1921 and was founded in November of 1945. A great idea but it fell victim to Jerry Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy:
Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy states that in any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people":
First, there will be those who are devoted to the goals of the organization. Examples are dedicated classroom teachers in an educational bureaucracy, many of the engineers and launch technicians and scientists at NASA, even some agricultural scientists and advisors in the former Soviet Union collective farming administration.
Secondly, there will be those dedicated to the organization itself. Examples are many of the administrators in the education system, many professors of education, many teachers union officials, much of the NASA headquarters staff, etc.
The Iron Law states that in every case the second group will gain and keep control of the organization. It will write the rules, and control promotions within the organization.
Maybe if enough nations leave, the unelected governing board of UNESCO will be forced to police themselves and become relevant again. They do some good work, the problem is that they pump out a lot of bad ideology too.
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