On Monday, the United Nations issued its most recent condemnation of Israel, a product of its Commission on the Status of Women. Sponsored by Ecuador on behalf of a group of 134 countries that include Iran, Sudan, and Yemen, the resolution blames Israel for every problem faced by Palestinian women, and calls for more money to be spent on programs that supposedly ameliorate these problems. Claudia Rosett writes:

It is illuminating—or it ought to be—that this latest anti-Israel resolution from the UN . . . followed a report on the same theme by the UN secretary-general, which included a litany of . . . at least fifteen UN offices, agencies, and/or special programs involved in assisting Palestinian women. With slight variations, this has been going on for decades. Yet somehow the UN reports, over and over, that the situation is endlessly dire. And while blaming and condemning Israel, the UN demands that yet more money flow to the aid of the Palestinians, via the UN.

This routine does not deserve to be described as “assistance” to women. There may be a smattering of aid in all this, but in the main this entire setup is a shakedown. Effectively it is an extortion racket that targets not only Israel (and its turf and legitimacy as a state) but also the U.S. (and its great rolling river of tax dollars).

This UN-abetted racket has become big business for Palestinian bosses, and a trough in which American tax dollars are transformed into a grand muck of resources that nourish the lies, bigotries, jobs, and wallets of far too many officials at the United Nations. And for the worst regimes associated with the UN (Iran and its pals come to mind) this is a political bonanza, underwritten by the Great Satan.

Any real remedy needs to start with cutting off the American money that helps bankroll this monstrous sham. And insofar as anyone’s aim is really to help Palestinian women, it’s hard to think of a better place to begin than by doing everything possible to remove from their lives—as well as ours—the pervasive and too often pernicious presence of the United Nations.

If Iran succeeds in obtaining nuclear weapons, the war in Gaza, let alone the protests on college campuses, will seem like a minor complication. Jonathan Schachter fears that this danger could be much more imminent than decisionmakers in Jerusalem and Washington believe. In his view, Israel seems to be repeating the mistake that allowed it to be taken by surprise on Simchat Torah of 2023 and Yom Kippur of 1973: putting too much faith in an intelligence concept that could be wrong.

Israel and the United States apparently believe that despite Iran’s well-documented progress in developing capabilities necessary for producing and delivering nuclear weapons, as well as its extensive and ongoing record of violating its international nuclear obligations, there is no acute crisis because building a bomb would take time, would be observable, and could be stopped by force. Taken together, these assumptions and their moderating impact on Israeli and American policy form a new Iran concept reminiscent of its 1973 namesake and of the systemic failures that preceded the October 7 massacre.

Meanwhile, most of the restrictions put in place by the 2015 nuclear deal will expire by the end of next year, rendering the question of Iran’s adherence moot. And the forces that could be taking action aren’t:

The European Union regularly issues boilerplate press releases asserting its members’ “grave concern.” American decisionmakers and spokespeople have created the unmistakable impression that their reservations about the use of force are stronger than their commitment to use force to prevent an Iranian atomic bomb. At the same time, the U.S. refuses to enforce its own sanctions comprehensively: Iranian oil exports (especially to China) and foreign-currency reserves have ballooned since January 2021, when the Biden administration took office.

Israel’s response has also been sluggish and ambiguous. Despite its oft-stated policy of never allowing a nuclear Iran, Israel’s words and deeds have sent mixed messages to allies and adversaries—perhaps inadvertently reinforcing the prevailing sense in Washington and elsewhere that Iran’s nuclear efforts do not present an exigent crisis.