An old video of Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan tearing a piece of paper while standing at a podium, is circulating with misleading claims that it is recent.
The clip is viral with claims that it shows Erdan tearing up a UN report documenting Israel's human rights violations in ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict.
BOOM found that the video is old and dates back to 2021.
In the video, Erdan rips apart a United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) report and accuses the council of bias against Israel, while delivering a speech at the UN General Assembly in New York. "This report... and it should have no place in anybody concerned with human rights, security or peace. Its only place is in the dustbin of antisemitism, and that is exactly how we shall treat it", Erdan says in the viral clip.
Israel declared a 'state of war' following a surprise attack by the Palestinian militant group Hamas on October 7. The recent conflict has resulted in the loss of over 4,000 lives from both sides. UN Secretary-General António Guterres on October 10 expressed concerns over 'full siege of the Gaza strip by Israel, shutting off electricity, water, food and fuel supplies. Guterres also stressed on the release of the Israeli hostage taken by Hamas.
Several Indian right-wing users posted the video with the caption, "United Nations summoned Israel and gave them a report on human rights violations. Israeli representative come on the stage, tore the report and went away. 57 countries with green flags could do nothing about it. This is how a strong and powerful country answers."
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The video has also been shared with a Hindi caption making a similar claim.
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Fact Check
BOOM performed a keyword search related to the topic and found multiple reports by Israel-based news outlets that reported the incident. These news articles were published on October 31, 2021.
One such report by The Jerusalem Post states that Gilad Erdan dramatically tore up a report by UNHRC due to their reported bias against Israel. An excerpt from The Jerusalem Post reads, "Since the council’s inception in 2006, it has issued 142 condemnations against UN member states, including 95 against Israel. This included the passage of four resolutions against Israel. A special session was also held during which the UNHRC voted to open a permanent probe against Israel’s alleged human-rights abuses in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and within sovereign Israel. Israel is the only country targeted with such an open-ended investigation."
Taking a cue, we scanned through the official X (formerly Twitter) profile of Gilad Erdan and found that Erdan posted a longer version of the same video on October 30, 2021.
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In the video Gilad Erdan said, "It was on this stage, at this very body, that the very right of the Jewish people to have a national home was itself declared to be racist. A decision that was justly overturned. A decision that Israel’s ambassador at the time, Chaim Herzog, tore up before the United Nations. And this is exactly what should be done to this antisemitic, distorted, one-sided report. For just as that 1975 resolution, equating Zionism with racism was itself a gross form of anti-Jewish racism, which has no place in this international body."
Erdan also said, "So too, the Human Rights Council’s obsessive anti-Israel bias, embodied, once again, by this report... and it should have no place in anybody concerned with human rights, security or peace. Its only place is in the dustbin of antisemitism, and that is exactly how we shall treat it." Erdan then goes on to tear the report.