Greg Bouwer
IINZ
Did you hear the latest? Guinness World Records – the organisation that claims to celebrate the extraordinary achievements of every corner of the globe – has quietly decided that one corner no longer counts.
And no, they’re not boycotting dictatorships, terror-sponsoring regimes, or countries that execute dissidents. They’re boycotting Israel – the only Jewish state on Earth, and the lone democracy in the Middle East.
Since shortly after October 7, Guinness has been “unable” to accept submissions from Israel (and, bizarrely, the Palestinian territories) due to the “current circumstances”. No explanation. No transparency. No principles. Just a discriminatory freeze targeting a single country.
One Israeli non-profit – Matnat Chaim – learned this first-hand when it attempted to register a remarkable humanitarian achievement: bringing together 2,000 voluntary kidney donors. Guinness refused. Yes, you read that correctly: they rejected a world record for saving lives.
Apparently, even a record about donating organs is too connected to the State of Israel for Guinness to tolerate.
Let’s be clear:
- Guinness still accepts submissions from dictatorships.
- Guinness still accepts submissions from regimes with political prisoners, mass censorship, and state-sponsored terror.
- Guinness still accepts submissions from countries literally committing ethnic cleansing today.
But Israel? The world’s only Jewish-majority state? Suddenly off-limits.
If there were a world record for hypocrisy, Guinness would not only qualify – they’d win by miles.
This is not neutrality. This is not caution. This is not “the current climate”. This is discrimination dressed up as procedure.
And when an international organisation singles out the world’s only Jewish state for unique exclusion – while bending over backward to avoid offending actual tyrannies – we know exactly what that looks like.
Guinness World Records has just set a new standard – a world record in cowardice and moral bankruptcy.
This article was originally published by the Israel Institute of New Zealand.
