It lists many reasons why Israel's separation barrier makes the lives of some Palestinians more difficult, highlighting farmers who need permits to work their land on the other side.
It is true - for a relatively small number of Palestinian farmers, the fence is a major inconvenience. There is nothing wrong with the UN highlighting their plight.
But there seems to be something missing from the analysis of a humanitarian affairs office.
The document begins with, "In 2002, the Israeli authorities started to build a Barrier with the stated aim of preventing violent attacks by Palestinians inside Israel."
By those criteria, was it successful?
Here are the number of Israelis killed in terror attacks, by year, from when construction began on the barrier:
The number of Israelis killed went down precipitously as the major parts of the barrier were completed.
It is hard to know exactly how much of the reduction was directly the result of the fence, of course; there were probably other factors. But according to one expert in the field, the barrier made all the difference:
Islamic Jihad leader Ramadan Shalah publicly admitted that Israel’s security fence is a significant obstacle to the Palestinian terrorist organizations. “If it weren’t there," he told Al-Manar Television, "the situation would be entirely different.”On November 11, 2006, Shalah granted a long interview to Al-Manar TV, Hizbullah’s television channel. He asserted that suicide bombing attacks are the Palestinian people’s “strategic choice” and the terrorist organizations have every intention of continuing suicide bombing attacks, but that their timing and the possibility of perpetrating them from the West Bank depends on other factors.“For example,” he said, “there is the separation fence, which is an obstacle to the resistance, and if it were not there the situation would be entirely different.”
According to the now dead Islamic Jihad leader, terror groups kept trying to blow up Jews and fully intended to continue, but the ugly wall stopped them.
Which means that the barrier has saved hundreds of Israeli lives - maybe thousands.
Now, why would the UN issue a report that only discusses how the fence is a detriment to Palestinian farmers' work, and not mention that it has largely fulfilled its purpose of saving many lives?
Unfortunately, the reason is because the UN doesn't consider saving Israeli lives to be a positive thing.
