Last Monday Gilad Erlan, Israel’s UN ambassador, brandished a yellow star—and said he wouldn’t take it off until the UN condemned Hamas. Erlan’s UN colleagues, as well as some Israeli officials, rolled their eyes.
Erlan, angered by the frosty reception, got an Auschwitz-style number tattoo at his local tattoo parlor and spent Tuesday flashing it at his colleagues. Most were unimpressed. But the ambassadors from Tuvalu, the Maldives, and Liechtenstein all said it looked very nice.
Now Erlan is upping the ante. Still wearing the yellow star and sporting the tattoo, the Israeli ambassador told the General Assembly this morning that unless it voted to condemn Hamas, he would build a gas chamber in his basement, buy a bottle of Zyklon B, and gas himself to death.
The General Assembly then voted 120 to 14, with 45 abstentions, in favor of a resolution that would provide funding for Erlan to purchase the bottle, build the chamber, and carry out his threat. Subsequently the Security Council passed a similar binding resolution, but it was quashed by a US veto.