There are many who continue to think of the United Nations as a harmless talking shop, where smaller states feel more important because they have one vote just like the United States, and hotheads innocuously blow off steam. Nothing could be further from the truth. The United Nations is a 20 billion dollar a year creature, and make no mistake, Israel is in its pincers. Last week’s New York Times advertisement signed by Madeline Albright, Brent Scowcroft, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Warren Christopher, and Thomas Pickering among many others, is an example of the grave risks involved in providing the UN with moral and political legitimacy. The advertisement urged the United States to dedicate itself to running American foreign policy through the UN - as an alleged “partner” in combating terrorism and preventing nuclear proliferation.
What kind of partner would the UN be? The United Nations still has no definition of terrorism, because for the states controlling the organization blowing up Israelis and Americans doesn’t count. The Security Council - with its Russian and Chinese vetoes - has already indicated that it has no capacity whatsoever to adopt a sanctions resolution which will prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.
Placing the UN front and center of American international relations will have many negative outcomes, but most importantly, this one: Israel will be first on the chopping block. The UN narrative, a lie that has entered the consciousness of do-gooders and evil-doers alike, is that Israel (the only democracy in the Middle East) is the root cause of the world’s ills, and the Palestinians are the most aggrieved people on earth. “Israel first” has long been the UN calling card. The story goes that if the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians is solved, antagonism against American and the rest of the world will cease, terrorism will fade away and error be no more. But the UN diplomats and their American apologists have the situation entirely backwards. Perpetuating the idea that Israelis are to blame for the continuing refugee status of Palestinians, and Arab rejectionism, is a perpetual recipe for drawing attention away from the Arab and Islamic world’s own failures and a never-ending excuse not to solve them. Keeping the United States and Israel safe will therefore necessitate that we do everything in our power to redirect the Obama administration away from the UN and not towards it.
