Last week, heads of state and high-ranking diplomats gathered at the United Nations for its annual General Assembly. Invariably at these conclaves, many make speeches that garner headlines but signify little; many others make speeches that largely go unnoticed. The real work, writes Micah Halpern, happens in the corridors and backrooms, where statesmen have a chance to discuss serious matters away from the cameras. And although the General Assembly, like so many UN bodies, is obsessed with condemning Israel, these corridors and backrooms give Jerusalem opportunities. Halpern writes:

It’s a well-kept secret that Israel is very active in helping other countries solve problems—especially in Africa. Israelis are particularly adept in helping African nations improve their ability to grow crops and expand their food sources. They teach them how to get more milk from cows and more eggs from chickens. They assist in productive irrigation and efficient crop growth. Israelis assist other nations with health care, computer technology, and communication services. And, of course, Israel aids countries with their infrastructure development, security, and defense.

And most of the deals between Israel and these other nations—many of whom refuse to acknowledge Israel’s existence, let alone shake the hand of an Israeli in public, are initiated and inked behind closed doors at UN committees and during annual General Assembly gatherings. . . .

Many bodies within the UN are still anti-Israel and the United Nations is still a platform for an ugly, deplorable form of anti-Semitism. . . . [Nonetheless], Israel contributes greatly to the UN and, by extension, to the world. Those contributions . . . slowly move publicly antagonistic countries closer to recognizing Israel as a full-fledged member of the community of nations.

While it is commendable that administrators of several universities finally called upon police to crack down on violent and disruptive anti-Israel protests, the actions they have taken may be insufficient. At Columbia, demonstrators reestablished their encampment on the main quad after it had been cleared by the police, and the university seems reluctant to use force again. The school also decided to hold classes remotely until the end of the semester. Such moves, whatever their merits, do nothing to fix the factors that allowed campuses to become hotbeds of pro-Hamas activism in the first place. The editors of National Review examine how things go to this point:

Since the 10/7 massacre, Columbia’s Jewish students have been forced to endure routine calls for their execution. It shouldn’t have taken the slaughter, rape, and brutalization of Israeli Jews to expose chants like “Globalize the intifada” and “Death to the Zionist state” as calls for violence, but the university refused to intervene on behalf of its besieged students. When an Israeli student was beaten with a stick outside Columbia’s library, it occasioned little soul-searching from faculty. Indeed, it served only as the impetus to establish an “Anti-Semitism Task Force,” which subsequently expressed “serious concerns” about the university’s commitment to enforcing its codes of conduct against anti-Semitic violators.

But little was done. Indeed, as late as last month the school served as host to speakers who praised the 10/7 attacks and even “hijacking airplanes” as “important tactics that the Palestinian resistance have engaged in.”

The school’s lackadaisical approach created a permission structure to menace and harass Jewish students, and that’s what happened. . . . Now is the time finally to do something about this kind of harassment and associated acts of trespass and disorder. Yale did the right thing when police cleared out an encampment [on Monday]. But Columbia remains a daily reminder of what happens when freaks and haters are allowed to impose their will on campus.