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Geneva, Switzerland -- The UN's Durban Review Conference opens here on Monday, but it will not have the participation of President Barack Obama -- a major disappointment for the United Nations and its admirers who complained of neglect during the Bush years.

The conference, which claims to address the "contemporary manifestations of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance," is just another opportunity for delegates to hurl epithets at the U.S. and Israel. The conference was on the Obama administration's wish list from the start. Shortly after winning the election in November, Mr. Obama signaled his desire to make the meeting, and his State Department worked hard to craft an outcome document it could support. At the United Nations, however, "change" does not come easy to those who harbor anti-Semitic views.

Had things gone their way, Team Obama hoped to send the President from the Summit of the Americas to "Durban II," as it is called here. Meet-ups with Daniel Ortega and Hugo Chavez in Trinidad could have been followed by a chance encounter in Geneva with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad -- cementing Obama's "Axis of Affection." Oh, what might have been.

Alas, Obama's much anticipated group hug with the United Nations will have to wait. But it should make you wonder. If Obama -- who has bowed to the Saudi king and rubbed elbows with Ortega and Chavez -- doesn't want to be seen in the company of these UN miscreants, what must they be up to?

In two words -- bureaucratic terrorism. The conference is dominated by the 57- member Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), and is used largely as a forum to promote hatred of Israel. The gathering in Geneva is a follow-on to the World Conference Against Racism held in Durban, South Africa in 2001 -- a conference which found the American and Israeli delegates walking out in protest. It was described by the late Tom Lantos, the only Holocaust survivor to serve in Congress, as "the most sickening and unabashed display of hate for Jews I had seen since the Nazi period."

This week's Durban Review Conference reaffirms the discredited text of the 2001 meeting, and adds an element which promotes censorship of speech that is deemed critical of Islam. In the most recent version of this conference's outcome document, one section states in part:

"...all dissemination of ideas based on racial superiority or hatred, incitement to racial discrimination as well as all acts of violence or incitement to such acts shall be declared offence punishable by law, in accordance with the international obligations of States..."

This text is part of a continuing effort by the OIC and the UN to prevent "the defamation of religions." The only religious criticism they wish to stop, however, is that of Islam. We've all seen the vitriolic and often violent response of Muslims to prominent criticisms, or perceived criticisms, of Islam or Mohammed. The Durban Review Conference aims to codify that attitude into international law.

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