Context

• The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) has announced that the United States will rejoin it in July, four years after it left the agency (along with Israel), alleging that UNESCO was biased against Israel. 
• The move to rejoin will face a vote by UNESCO’s member states and is expected to pass easily.

About UNESCO 

• UNESCO is a UN agency tasked with furthering international cooperation and peace through the promotion of educational, scientific and cultural causes. 
• For instance, it designates locations globally as World Heritage Sites, which means international recognition and possible funding. 
• The United States was a founding member of UNESCO in 1945.

What made the US leave UNESCO?

• The United States was a major contributor to UNESCO’s budget until 2011 – when the body admitted Palestine as a member state.
• Notably, Palestine is not recognised as a sovereign state by the United Nations. 
• That triggered an end to the contributions – which Washington paid around $75 million or around 22 percent of UNESCO’s budget – under US law. But the US didn’t leave the group in 2011.
• In 2017, then president Donald Trump announced that the United States and Israel were withdrawing from UNESCO due to its ‘bias’ against the Jewish state. The United States officially left the agency in 2018.
• Israel has long accused the United Nations of anti-Israel bias. In 2012, over Israeli objections, the state of Palestine was recognised as a non-member observer state by the UN General Assembly, meaning it could participate in General Assembly proceedings but lacked voting rights.
• The Palestinians claim the West Bank, east Jerusalem and Gaza Strip — territories captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war — for an independent state. Israel says the Palestinians’ efforts to win recognition at the UN are aimed at circumventing a negotiated settlement and meant to pressure Israel into concessions.

Not first go-around

• Interestingly, this is the second time the United States has withdrawn from UNESCO.
• Washington in 1984 under then president Ronald Reagan withdrew the US from UNESCO because it viewed the agency as mismanaged, corrupt and used to advance Soviet interests.
• In 2003, after a 20-year absence, Washington rejoined the group under then president George W Bush.
• This came as the US wanted to “emphasize a message of international cooperation” in the backdrop of it launching its Iraq war.

Why does it want to rejoin the agency?

• To counter China’s influence.
• Officials in Washington say the decision to return was motivated by concern that China is filling the gap left by the US in UNESCO policymaking –  notably in setting standards for artificial intelligence and technology education around the world.

https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/us-rejoin-unesco-israel-palestine-explained-8661069/#:~:text=And%20why%20has%20the%20US,technology%20education%20around%20the%20world.