The conference is ongoing, but, with the conference declaration passed and the drama of walkouts subsided, there is a definite sense of anti-climax.

If you’re an NGO, not so much. The European Union of Jewish Students, and perhaps other Jewish student groups, have lost their accreditation to the Durban Review Conference for standing up to Ahmadinejad in the corridors of the Palais des Nations yesterday. (The now-famous clowns who protested in the assembly hall were actually from the French Union of Jewish Students, but that distinction seems to have been lost on the conference secretariat.)

Signs, placards, and costumes are apparently against UN rules. Of course, so is calling for the eradication of another member state, but no one seems particularly eager to enforce that one.

This is significant, at the Czech Republic holds the EU Presidency, and had previously suggested it would therefore continue to participate as long as other European countries did. This is a rare and total splintering of the European consensus at the UN, especially in Geneva. Five member states, including the Presidency, have left their counterparts behind.

• Ahmadinejad still thinks that Israel shouldn’t exist, and that the world should urgently act to eradicate it. These views led at least a handful of delegates to applaud.
• He was allowed to speak first at the general debate — “to accomodate the schedules of visiting dignitaries,” wink, wink — making him into a keynoter of sorts.

The good news:

• He was greeted by hundreds of protestors.
• Most or all of Europe — and, reportedly, Morocco – walked out. And his speech was roundly condemned as the nasty bit of hate-mongering that it was.

3:15 – Of course, Ahmadinejad gets a polite introduction.

Among the key speakers: Ashraf El Hagog, the Palestinian doctor who was imprisoned, tortured, and sentenced to death in Libya for supposedly infecting children with AIDS. UN Watch had previously brought him in to speak at the UN — and this happened.

Also, check out Zvika Krieger’s reflections over at The New Republic.