Isreal, Canada and the United States have recently been joined by Italy, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic in boycotting the UN's Durbin III conference in New York on September 22. The session is a celebration of the 10th anniversary of the first Durbin conference, which found that racism exists in only one country in the world: Israel. (Durbin II was poignantly opened by Iran's Ahmadinejad on the anniversary of Hitler's birth.)

The co-chairs of Durbin III insist they will "not re-open previously agreed text" in the Durbin Declaration, which condemned only Israel, and so the commemoration is simply a another platform for the routine expression of anti-Semitism at the UN. (Documents and history of the Durbin conferences available here.)

Anne Bayefsky of Eye on the UN neatly summarizes the situation:

Durban III - as was easily predicted - is a battleground between weak-kneed, anxious-to-please democratic countries and shameless, brazen non-democracies who hold the balance of power at the General Assembly.

America's boycott is as commendable as much of Europe's tolerance is condemnable.