Editorial Collective
We present here the text of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) Resolution 3379, passed in 1975, directly alongside the text of its revocation, passed in 1991. To complement these primary documents, we include a brief critical bibliography contextualizing and analyzing three overlapping areas of inquiry: UNGA resolution 3379; Zionism as Racism; and UN, International Law, and Zionism. This bibliography is not exhaustive; rather, it is intended to serve as a starting point for further research and critical engagement with these topics.
Elimination of all forms of racial discrimination: Zionism as racism – GA resolution 1
RESOLUTION ADOPTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY
[on the report of the Third Committee (A/10320)]
3379 (XXX). Elimination of all forms of racial discrimination
The General Assembly,
Recalling its resolution 1904 (XVIII) of 20 November 1963, proclaiming the United Nations Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, and in particular its affirmation that “any doctrine of racial differentiation or superiority is scientifically false, morally condemnable, socially unjust and dangerous” and its expression of alarm at “the manifestations of racial discrimination still in evidence in some areas in the world, some of which are imposed by certain Governments by means of legislative, administrative or other measures”,
Recalling also that, in its resolution 3151 G (XXVIII) of 14 December 1973, the General Assembly condemned, inter alia, the unholy alliance between South African racism and zionism,
Taking note of the Declaration of Mexico on the Equality of Women and Their Contribution to Development and Peace, proclaimed by the World Conference of the International Women’s Year, held at Mexico City from 19 June to 2 July 1975, which promulgated the principle that “international co-operation and peace require the achievement of national liberation and independence, the elimination of colonialism and neo-colonialism, foreign occupation, zionism, apartheid and racial discrimination in all its forms, as well as the recognition of the dignity of peoples and their right to self-determination”,
Taking note also of resolution 77 (XII) adopted by the Assembly of Heads of State and Government of the Organization of African Unity at its twelfth ordinary session, hold at Kampala from 28 July to 1 August 1975, which considered “that the racist regime in occupied Palestine and the racist regimes in Zimbabwe and South Africa have a common imperialist origin, forming a whole and having the same racist structure and being organically linked in their policy aimed at repression of the dignity and integrity of the human being”,
Taking note also of the Political Declaration and Strategy to Strengthen International Peace and Security and to Intensify Solidarity and Mutual Assistance among Non-Aligned Countries, adopted at the Conference of Ministers for Foreign Affairs of Non-Aligned Countries held at Lima from 25 to 30 August 1975, which most severely condemned zionism as a threat to world peace and security and called upon all countries to oppose this racist and imperialist ideology,
Determines that [Z]ionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination.
2400th plenary meeting
10 November 1975
46/86. Elimination of racism and racial discrimination 2
The General Assembly
Decides to revoke the determination contained in its resolution 3379 (XXX) of 10 November 1975.
74th plenary meeting
16 December 1991
Critical Bibliography:
UNGA Resolution 3379
Erakat, Noura. “Zionism as a Form of Racism.” In Race and the Question of Palestine, ed. Lana Tatour and Ronit Lentin (Stanford University Press, 2025).
Erakat, Noura, Darryl Li, and John Reynolds. “Race, Palestine, and International Law,” AJIL Unbound 117 (2023): 77–81.
Feldman, Keith. “Specters of Genocide: Cold War Exceptions and the Contradictions of Liberalism.” In A Shadow over Palestine: The Imperial Life of Race in America (University of Minnesota Press, 2015).
Ginsberg, Terri. “Jabara’s Classic ‘Zionism: Racism or Liberation?’ Deserves a New Life,” Mondoweiss, May 7, 2013. https://mondoweiss.net/2013/05/jabaras-liberation-deserves/.
Jabara, Abdeen. “Zionism and Racism.” Arab World Issues Occasional Paper 3. Association of Arab-American University Graduates, 1976.
Harfouch, John. “‘The Being of Israel Is the Non-being of Palestine’: Understanding Zionism through the Work of Fayez Sayegh,” Liberated Texts (2025), https://liberatedtexts.com/reviews/the-being-of-israel-is-the-non-being-of-palestine-understanding-zionism-through-the-work-of-fayez-sayegh.
Sayegh, Fayez. Zionism: A Form of Racism and Racial Discrimination (Office of the Permanent Observer of the Palestine Liberation Organization to the United Nations, 1976).
جبور، جورج. العنصرية الصهيونية و المجتمع الدولى. مؤسسة الدراسات الفلسطينية، 1991.
Zionism as Racism
Abu El-Haj, Nadia. “Racial Palestinianization and the Janus-Faced Nature of the Israeli State,” Patterns of Prejudice 44, no. 1 (2010): 27–41.
Kelley, Robin D. G. “An Anti-Racist Movement,” Social Text, November 13, 2016, https://socialtextjournal.org/periscope_article/an-anti-racist-movement/
Kelley, Robin D. G. “From the River to the Sea to Every Mountain Top: Solidarity as Worldmaking,” Journal of Palestine Studies 48, no. 4 (192) (2019): 69–91.
Massad, Joseph. “The Ends of Zionism: Racism and the Palestinian Struggle,” Interventions 5, no. 3 (2003): 440–48.
Palestine Research Center. Israeli Racism (Palestine Liberation Organization Research Center, 1975).
Sa’b, Hasan. Zionism & Racism (Palestine Liberation Organization Research Center, 1965).
Sayegh, Fayez. Zionist Colonialism in Palestine (Palestine Liberation Organization Research Center, 1965).
مصطفى، فضلون م. م. “الصهيونية العالمية و خطرها على الإنسانية.” مجلة کلية الدراسات الإسلامية والعربية 20 ، العدد 1 (2023): 96-132. https://byn.journals.ekb.eg/article_328795_f4670e46640dc141b3603cfee5673f48.pdf#page=1.00&gsr=0
UN, International Law, and Zionism
Allain, Jean. International Law in the Middle East: Closer to Power than Justice (Routledge, 2004).
Bennis, Phyllis. “The United Nations and Palestine: Partition and Its Aftermath,” Arab Studies Quarterly 19, no. 3 (1997): 47–76.
Erakat, Noura. Justice for Some: Law and the Question of Palestine (Stanford University Press, 2019).
Imseis, Ardi. Palestine, the United Nations and International Legal Subalternity (Cambridge University Press, 2023).
Imseis, Ardi. “The United Nations Plan of Partition for Palestine Revisited: On the Origins of Palestine’s International Legal Subalternity,” Stanford Journal of International Law 57, no. 1 (2021): 1-54.
Imseis, Ardi. “Negotiating the Illegal: On the United Nations and the Illegal Occupation of Palestine, 1967–2020,” European Journal of International Law 31, no. 3 (August 2020): 1055–85.
Mazower, Mark. No Enchanted Palace: The End of Empire and the Ideological Origins of the United Nations (Princeton University Press: 2009).
Naber, Nadine, Eman Desouky, and Lina Baroudi. “The Forgotten ‘-ism’: An Arab American Women’s Perspective on Zionism, Racism, and Sexism.” In Color of Violence: The INCITE! Anthology, eds. INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence (Duke University Press, 2016).
Sarsar, Saliba. “The Question of Palestine and United States Behavior at the United Nations,” International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society 17, no. 3 (2004): 457–70.
Strawson, John. Partitioning Palestine: Legal Fundamentalism in the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict (Pluto, 2010).
Endnotes
- “Resolution 3379: Elimination of all forms of racial discrimination.” UNGA, 10 November 1975, https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-181963. ↩
- “Resolution 4686: Racism and racial discrimination/Revocation of resolution 3379 (‘Zionism as racism’).” UNGA, 16 December 1991, https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-180327. ↩