The Biden administration declined to veto a United Nations Security Council resolution on Monday that aims to limit Israel’s ability to win its war against Hamas. Washington’s action is short-sighted and counterproductive.
The resolution calls for a “ceasefire” in Gaza. Four members of the U.N. Security Council voted in favor of the resolution, while the United States abstained. Israel responded by scrapping plans to send a delegation to Washington. This was the fourth attempt in recent days to pass the resolution, with members of the Security Council haggling over its language.
The U.N., which has a long track record of anti-Israel bias, had been pushing for similar resolutions for months.
In October last year, the secretary-general of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, even appeared to justify the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre by Hamas, saying that it was the culmination of “years of suffocating occupation.” Guterres had effectively blamed the largest slaughter of Jewish civilians since the Holocaust on Jews themselves — a staple of antisemitic rhetoric.
For months, the U.S. has worked to prevent the passage of Security Council resolutions that condemned Israel or limited its ability to defend itself. That policy is now at an end. And it’s worth asking why.
The Biden administration has faced growing criticism from the anti-Israel Left, including members of Congress such as Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), and other factions of its progressive base. By some accounts, the administration is concerned about turnout in Michigan, a battleground state in an election year, and hopes to appease anti-Israel members of its coalition.
Unfortunately, domestic political concerns seem to have trumped sound strategy.
The U.N.’s anti-Israel bias is undeniable. Key U.N. bodies, such as the Human Rights Council, are routinely staffed by despotic regimes such as Iran, Russia, Syria, and others. As U.N. Watch has documented, the U.N. passes more resolutions condemning the democratic nation of Israel than any other country. Traditionally, the U.S. has stood up against the U.N.’s antisemitism and double standards. It has even become something of a proud tradition, with various U.S. ambassadors to the U.N., such as Jeane Kirkpatrick, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Nikki Haley, and others, fighting efforts to malign the Jewish state. For months after Oct. 7, the Biden administration has done much the same.
Militarily, Israel has been winning its war against Hamas. Defying its critics who predicted that Jerusalem would get bogged down in a protracted war, the Israel Defense Forces have made rapid advances and incurred far fewer losses than some, including policymakers in Washington, expected. And while civilian casualties have been high, urban warfare is always brutal. Most important of all, Hamas began this war with an unspeakable atrocity. Israel is seeking to end the threat that Hamas poses.
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That matters because Hamas is on the ropes, holed up in its last refuge in Rafah. Yet certain elements, including the terrorist group’s patrons in Tehran and Doha, hope that Hamas can live to fight another day.
Ensuring Hamas’s survival is tantamount to guaranteeing future wars between Israel and the Iranian proxies who seek its destruction. It signals weakness in a famously tough part of the world. And it shows that the U.S. can’t be counted on to stand by its friends when the going gets tough. America’s allies, from the Gulf and beyond, will be watching and taking notes.
The writer is a senior research analyst for CAMERA, the 65,000-member, Boston-based Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis.