Being an ambassador does not mean being diplomatic, although it may sound incoherent. Gilad Erdan, head of Israel's mission to the UN, has managed to annoy practically everyone, except perhaps his boss, Benjamin Netanyahu, with his outbursts and bravado in his interventions in this forum. No one, not even the United States, supported his request for the resignation of the secretary general of the institution, António Guterres, and even his own people have attacked him for displaying a Star of David on the lapel of his jacket during one of his speeches.
The person in charge of the Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem broadcast his complaint about the use of that yellow symbol, with the legend “never again,” during Monday's Security Council session. He attacked his compatriot because that "label," used by the Nazis to identify Jews, is a dishonor to both the country and the victims of the Holocaust.
Dani Dayan, president of the Yad Vashem museum, stated in a post on X, a network formerly known as Twitter, that “the yellow sticker symbolizes the helplessness of Jewish citizens when they were at the mercy of others.” And he clarified that, at this time, Israelis “have an independent country and a strong army, we are the masters of our destiny.”
Therefore, what is required now, Dayan stressed, “is to put the blue and white flag on the lapel, not the yellow star.” He also reiterated that “blue and white represent strength.”
Under Adolf Hitler's regime, Jews were ordered to wear a yellow star during the Holocaust period as an identifying element. This marked their isolation and marked them for harassment, while amplifying the separation between Jews and other members of society.
In that session of the Security Council, Erdan wore that symbol, compared the Iranian president to Hitler, maintained that Hamas seeks "the final solution", a term very typical of the Nazis, and accused the UN and its executive body of failing to condemns the perpetrators of the attack on Israel on October 7.
In this sense, where disproportionate retaliation is justified despite the indiscriminate death of Palestinian civilians, Erdan stressed that the absence of a formal condemnation by the council is reminiscent of the broad international failure to take a stand against the Holocaust in World War II. .
In that speech he recalled that his grandfather died in the Auschwitz concentration camp and that he and his team intended to wear the yellow star from that moment on. “Every time you look at me, you will remember what it means to remain silent in the face of evil,” he stressed in a tone of absolute fury. Once he said this, he put on the star and his advisors imitated him.
Criticism of this initiative also occurred among senior officials in the foreign ministries of many countries, including allies.
The war between Israel and Hamas takes place in the Gaza Strip and is staged in the United Nations. The Security Council has become a verbal battlefield, where the inability to find a consensual response to the brutal aggression of Hamas and the subsequent Israeli retaliatory massacre has been demonstrated. It all started when the United States vetoed a resolution that condemned the violence of that terrorist attack but demanded a ceasefire.
Days later, Russia and China gave the same reply to a US resolution, which only spoke of "humanitarian pauses", while, in that same session, Washington vetoed another from Moscow, which did not condemn Hamas.
Erdan's role began last week by calling for Guterres' “immediate resignation.” The Secretary General made a more than explicit condemnation of the terrorists, but also cited that this did not arise from a vacuum, but that there were 56 years of oppression and occupation of Palestinian territories behind it.
The matter reached the General Assembly, which, by a large majority, voted in favor of an immediate ceasefire. Israel, the United States and twelve other countries opposed it. This order has no legal value, but represents a global setback to the diplomacy of the duo formed by the governments of Jerusalem and Washington.
