UNITED NATIONS – A proposed resolution to be adopted in Geneva at a special emergency session of the newest United Nations body would send the human rights commissioner on a rare “urgent” Middle East trip designed to document Israeli rights violations.

The proposed resolution, and the U.N. Human Rights Council’s singling out of Israel for rebuke in its regular session that ended Friday, have raised concerns among American officials as well as some nongovernmental organizations that the newly created rights body would revert to the Israel-bashing and politicization that discredited its predecessor, the Commission on Human Rights, and led to that organ’s demise.

In its inaugural session, the Geneva-based council passed several resolutions on general topics such as the rights of “indigenous” people and the opposition to “religious discrimination” – raised by Saudi Arabia to highlight purported anti-Muslim Danish cartoons. It also extended for one year the mandate of all its predecessor’s “special rapporteurs,” who are charged with documenting violations in certain areas and countries.

The council did not pass specific resolutions on the deteriorating situation in Sudan or violations of rights in any other country. On the last day of its inaugural session, however, it voted to condemn alleged Israeli violations. It also decided to extend indefinitely the mandate of the special rapporteur there. And as soon as the session ended, the council immediately decided, with the support of more than the required third of its membership, to convene the emergency session that will begin today.

“The council’s singling out the Occupied Palestinian Territories for special attention is a cause for concern,” Human Rights Watch’s Peggy Hicks said in a statement. “The human rights situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territories deserves attention, but the new council must bring the same vigor to its consideration of other pressing situations.”

On the other hand, Amnesty International, according to a statement on its Web site, “welcomes the Council’s decision to convene a Special Session on human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and calls for concrete action to address the gross human rights abuses currently taking place there.”

Both Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, however, stated that other situations, including Sudan, need to be addressed.

The emergency session’s resolution proposal is sponsored by mostly Arab and Islamic countries, including Sudan. A draft, seen by The New York Sun, is presented by Tunisia, which currently holds the presidency of the Arab group, and is co-sponsored by 13 Islamic and Arab countries, as well as Cuba. In addition to Sudan, the signatories include Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Egypt. The proposal is widely expected to pass by a sizable margin.

The council, according to the draft, “requests the high Commissioner on Human Rights to undertake an urgent visit to the Occupied Palestinian Territory and to report on the Israeli human rights violations therein.”

The proposed resolution also expresses concerns about rights “violations” by Israel, including the “current Israeli extensive military operation against Palestinians,” and urges Israel to “immediately release” Hamas legislators and other Palestinian Arab politicians it has recently arrested, “as well as other arrested Palestinian civilians.”

Sending the commissioner, Louise Arbour, to the territories is “a rare move intended to severely harm Israel in the public eye,” the director of the Geneva-based human rights organization U.N. Watch, Hillel Neuer, told the Sun. He added that such trips always end with the condemnation of the visited country. The proposed resolution, he added, “is entirely one-sided, ignoring the Palestinian terror and Kassam rockets that continue to target Israel civilians.”

The Human Rights Council was hailed earlier this year by U.N. officials and international human rights organizations as a vast improvement over the commission it replaced. Secretary-General Annan and others have said the commission discredited itself by electing some of the worst human rights violators as members and by using human rights as a political tool.

Arguing that the 47-member council is not enough of an improvement on the 53-member commission, America voted against its creation. It was joined by only three other countries, including Israel, which opposed the General Assembly resolution that created the council with the support of the vast majority of the members and Mr. Annan. America declined to run for a seat on the council this year, but it vowed to support it diplomatically and financially.

“Rather than address a number of urgent human rights situations around the world in a fair, equitable, and balanced way, this new Human Rights Council has instead pursued an unbalanced agenda to single out and focus on Israel alone,” the American ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, Warren Tichenor, said in a speech at the council on Friday.

“We are back in the dark days of selectivity and politicization,” Mr. Neuer said. “In Geneva, tragically, it’s business as usual.”