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UN Adopts Resolution Singling Out Israel For Women’s Rights Violations

(Photo by JAAFAR ASHTIYEH/AFP via Getty Images)

Brianna Lyman News and Commentary Writer
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The United Nations (UN) Economic and Social Council, made up of 54 members including Iran, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, rebuked Israel for allegedly violating women’s rights.

The council voted Tuesday to adopt a resolution accusing Israel of “systematic violation of the human rights of the Palestinian people…and its impact on women and girls.”

“The Israeli occupation remains a major obstacle for Palestinian women and girls with regard to the fulfillment of their rights, and their advancement, self-reliance and integration in the development of their society,” the resolution reads.

While the resolution itself made a worldwide reference to “violence against women and girls in all its different forms and manifestations worldwide,” Israel was the only nation singled out.

Israel’s representative described the measure as politically motivated and says it wrongly puts all the blame on Israel, according to the United Nations.

Australia, Canada and the United States voted against adopting the resolution, per the UN. (RELATED: ‘New Dawn Of Peace’: President Trump, Arab, Israeli Leaders To Sign Historic Abraham Accords)

On the other hand, Cuba, Syria, and North Korea sponsored the resolution, according to UN Watch.

Iran, who voted to adopt the resolution, is known for torturing and murdering its own citizens, including women. Iranian law also considers same-sex relationships as offenses punishable by death, according to the Human Rights Watch (HRW). A prominent human rights lawyer, Nasrin Sotoudeh, was detained in June of 2018 and sentenced to 33 years in prison along with 148 lashes for her peaceful activism, per the same report.

A Saudi woman receives her newly-issued passport at the Immigration and Passports Centre in the capital Riyadh on August 29, 2019. - Saudi Arabia has eased travel restrictions on women, allowing those aged over 21 to obtain passports without seeking the approval of their "guardians" - fathers, husbands or other male relatives, but observers say loopholes still allow male relatives to curtail their movements and, in the worst cases, leave them marooned in prison-like shelters. (Photo by FAYEZ NURELDINE / AFP) (Photo by FAYEZ NURELDINE/AFP via Getty Images)

A Saudi woman receives her newly-issued passport at the Immigration and Passports Centre in the capital Riyadh on August 29, 2019. – Saudi Arabia has eased travel restrictions on women, allowing those aged over 21 to obtain passports without seeking the approval of their “guardians” – fathers, husbands or other male relatives, but observers say loopholes still allow male relatives to curtail their movements and, in the worst cases, leave them marooned in prison-like shelters. (Photo by FAYEZ NURELDINE / AFP) (Photo by FAYEZ NURELDINE/AFP via Getty Images)

In Saudi Arabia, another nation who voted to adopt the resolution condemning Israel for alleged human rights violations, women are controlled by men their entire life and must have a male guardian who makes decisions on her behalf, according to the HRW. Saudi women are also subjected to employment discrimination, abuse and political repression, per the same report.