The objective of this online celebration which is being hosted by the International Coalition for Israel (ICI)* is to demonstrate worldwide support for Israel at a time when the United Nations is making its own plans to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the failed Durban World Conference against Racism with an event in New York which has already been boycotted by twelve nations. Instead of eliminating racism, as stated in its objectives, the UN conference in Durban in 2001 released a wave of vicious antisemitism, encouraging new movements and organisations with the sole aim to discredit and demonize the Jewish State of Israel. Holocaust survivor and former US Congressman Tom Lantos has rightly called it “his worst experience of antisemitism after Nazi-Germany.”

But the disastrous week in Durban twenty years ago also marked the birth of another new movement, one which would step up to support Israel and stand on the side of the Jewish people in international arenas such as the European Union in Brussels and later also at the United Nations in New York. The Global Celebrate Israel Marathon will mark the 20th anniversary of the European Coalition for Israel, thus adding to the celebratory nature of the event.

“We want to light a candle, rather than curse the darkness”, explains ECI Founding Director Tomas Sandell. “This is our candle of hope in a world full of so much hatred, especially Jew hatred. We want to spell it out, loud and clear, in speeches, through music, poems and dances, that we celebrate Israel and cherish the presence of the Jewish communities among us!”

All continents will be represented in the online marathon, which will also feature greetings from Durban, South Africa, the seat of the UN World Conference against Racism twenty years ago, and a live rally outside the UN Headquarters in Geneva.