UN head won’t speak at NYC shul Holocaust memorial event for first time in years

The secretary general of the United Nations, António Guterres, will not speak at a Holocaust remembrance service at a Shul that has invited him for years. For the first time since taking office in 2018, Guterres has not been invited to the annual International Holocaust Remembrance Day memorial service at the Park East Synagogue in New York this Saturday.

The shul’s senior rabbi, Arthur Schneier, has previously invited Guterres to address the service.

In 2019, Guterres said he felt “at home at Park East Synagogue.” He has previously used his address to condemn contemporary antisemitism.

According to Ynet, Guterres said: "After the terrorist attacks by Hamas on October 7, and the subsequent increase in antisemitism and the ongoing pain of the community, the ceremony in the synagogue will focus on the healing and testimony of survivors. It will not be an event for the diplomatic community and therefore the secretary-general will not participate."

Instead of Guterres, the Consul General of Israel in New York, Aviv Ezra, will address the event.

Ezra will use his speech to remember the October 7 massacre as well as the 79th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. The service will hear testimony from a former hostage, as well as a brother and sister of a hostage still held by Hamas.

A spokesperson for the Shul told the JC: “Park East Synagogue International Holocaust Remembrance Day Shabbat Service this year will focus on the Shoah and the barbaric attack on Israel on October 7th, the kidnapped, the rise of worldwide anti-Semitism, and internal pain.”

Guterres will speak at the UN’s own Holocaust Memorial Ceremony on Friday alongside Holocaust survivors.

Since October 7, both the secretary general and the UN more widely have come under fire for their response to Hamas’s atrocities. Guterres was slammed by Israeli officials when he said that the Hamas attack “did not happen in a vacuum.”

UN Women, the UN’s women’s rights agency, has also been criticized for taking 55 days to issue a statement on the massacre which saw rape used by Hamas as a weapon of war.