OPINION:
As the United Nations General Assembly convenes in New York this week, all eyes will be on Lebanon, and all daggers will be drawn to blame Israel. But in looking to ascribe blame, paraphrasing Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz,” they should look no further than their own backyard.
To that end, I launched a plan to send mirrors to each of the U.N. member states (and observers) to mount behind the microphone and their country’s name, so when they sit in the General Assembly and blame Israel, they can see where the real blame lies.
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Let’s be clear, every death and all the destruction taking place in Lebanon now is because of Hezbollah, and its Iranian Islamic patron. The Islamic regime has been funding and arming Hezbollah for decades, having hijacked Lebanon and putting all its residents in harm’s way. The long-range missiles being destroyed in Lebanese civilian homes and garages are not part of a “terrorist chic” interior design trend. It is a central pillar of the “Axis of Resistance” decades-long plan to eradicate Israel.
Minimally, the U.N. is complicit and guilty of enabling all this. It’s too egregious to be a passive oversight. At best, they get an assist in the death and destruction that’s happened so far, and what may come. It’s all the U.N.’s fault.
The best example is the flagrant violation of U.N. Resolution 1701 that ended the 2006 Second Lebanon War. Before the ink dried, Hezbollah and Lebanon were ignoring the text, and the U.N. turned a blind eye.
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Resolution 1701 requires “full implementation of the relevant provisions of the Taif Accords, and of resolutions 1559 (2004) and 1680 (2006), that require the disarmament of all armed groups in Lebanon, so that, pursuant to the Lebanese cabinet decision of July 27, 2006, there will be no weapons or authority in Lebanon other than that of the Lebanese state.”
The Lebanese cabinet approved 1701, yet Hezbollah never had any intent to implement any of it. Already entrenched in the Lebanese parliament, with a military arguably stronger than the Lebanese Armed Forces, Hezbollah is the authority that calls the shots in Lebanon. It has nothing to do with Hezbollah’s presence south of the Litani River. Resolution 1701 says Hezbollah cannot exist as a military in Lebanon, period. The U.N. and its puppet, United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), never tried to enforce that.
Resolution 1701 was never implemented. While Israeli troops withdrew from Lebanon, Hezbollah never did. Not only did they not withdraw, but Hezbollah significantly increased their weapons in terms of quantity and quality, all backed by Iran. Today, they have an estimated 150,000 rockets and missiles of all varieties that can strike all of Israel, and numerous drones as well. Not only did they not withdraw but Hezbollah has become deeply entrenched, excavating terror tunnels, weapon stashes, airstrips, and military installations.
All of this has been under the noses of Lebanese civilians in whose cities, towns, and villages Hezbollah has made them human shields, and under the noses of UNIFIL. The truth is that the Lebanese civilians who allowed their country to be hijacked by the Shiite Islamists are also guilty. I realize that confronting Hezbollah is dangerous, but what did the neighbors think when a huge truck pulled up in their neighborhood, unloading a delivery that was several meters long? That it was IKEA shelving unit?
One might say the U.N. failed, but failure requires an attempt. The U.N. and UNIFIL never made an effort. They are complicit. That’s why they are to blame for what’s happening in Lebanon (and Israel) and among the international players that made it possible.
Complementing this all, France is leading the charge with the U.S. and others for a 21-day ceasefire. This is disgusting because rather than calling for an immediate cessation of hostilities by Hezbollah, after nearly a year of daily firing into Israel, and a no-negotiations upholding of 1701, they make a false equivalence between the terrorist aggressor, and Israel acting with brilliant precision in self-defense against an Iranian-backed terrorist organization that has hijacked a member state, while calling for the destruction of another.
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While condemnation of Israel is the lifeblood of the U.N. (with more anti-Israel resolutions each year than the sum of all the resolutions against actual terrorist states like Iran, Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, N. Korea, and more), maybe if they are looking deeply in the mirrors in front of them, they will have a reflective moment of introspection. Maybe, in the spirit of the season of the Jewish High Holidays, the U.N. will break out in mass repentance.
Maybe the U.N. will ban the Iranian president, if not have him arrested upon arrival, as the one country in the U.N. that threatens the existence of another: Israel.
Maybe they will realize that the “State of Palestine” which they recognize is no more a state than Freedonia, and were it ever to become a state, it would be an immediate enemy and threat to another state: Israel.
And that’s assuming the Palestinian Arabs could agree on who is in charge of their “state,” Hamas or the PLO whose Palestinian Authority president is nearing 20 years in his four-year term, and who have spent decades killing one another.
Maybe the U.N. repenting and developing a moral backbone is all no more than a fantasy than Dorothy’s dream. It’s hard to imagine with the U.N. leaders from the Secretary-General (whose immediate response to the Oct. 7, 2023 massacre in Israel, was to rationalize the context), and U.N. agencies that are still directly complicit in supporting terror.
No doubt as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks at the U.N. this week, there will be protests inside and outside. Countries will continue to line up to take their stab at blaming Israel for a situation it never asked for, with thousands of missiles being fired at cities from Tel Aviv north, leaving more than half the population in range. This is of course as compared to the precision strikes that have taken out much of Hezbollah’s top leadership, keeping civilian casualties to the minimum.
In an interview this week, a journalist asked me what’s the point of Israel even staying in the U.N. To be honest, I don’t have a good answer. The U.N. is a corrupt, immoral, and ineffective organization, wasting billions. Perhaps when world leaders look into the mirror they will see and take responsibility for all the suffering.
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Jonathan Feldstein was born and educated in the U.S. and immigrated to Israel in 2004. He is married and the father of six. Throughout his life and career, he has become a respected bridge between Jews and Christians and serves as president of the Genesis 123 Foundation (www.Genesis123.co). He writes regularly about Israel and shares experiences of living as an Orthodox Jew in Israel. He is host of the popular Inspiration from Zion podcast and publisher of www.IsraeltheMiracle.com. He can be reached at firstpersonisrael@gmail.com.
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