The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) came into being in 1978, when Lebanon was in the midst of a civil war and the IDF was trying to stop Palestinian terrorists from launching raids and rockets into the Galilee. After the 2006 war, the UN revamped its mission (updated for a different terrorist group): to keep Hizballah away from the Israeli border and keep the peace between the two sides. Not only did it fail at that task completely, Tony Badran explains, its presence shielded Hizballah from attack and strengthened its economic base:

Just how blatantly Hizballah operated with UNIFIL’s blessing became clear after Israel launched its invasion of southern Lebanon on September 30. IDF units operating close to Israel’s northern border uncovered the openings of elaborate, large-scale Hizballah tunnel networks a few yards away from UNIFIL positions. It was clearly impossible for UNIFIL commanders not to have been fully aware of the construction of those positions and their use by large squads of armed Hizballah militants who moved in and out. Needless to say, the construction and deployment of Hizballah’s tunnel network, which made a mockery of UNIFIL’s supposed role in demilitarizing southern Lebanon, was never reported back to the UN through official channels or made public. Instead, UNIFIL paid local Hizballah operatives and supporters to act as contractors and provide other services, essentially melding its functions with those of the terrorist army for which it was providing cover.

UNIFIL only bestirred itself to comment when the IDF moved in to dismantle Hizballah’s infrastructure—not to denounce the terror organization for blatantly abusing its hospitality and violating its mandate, but by refusing to withdraw from its positions adjacent to the terror group’s fortifications in order to keep Israel from blowing them up.

In the event Donald Trump wins [the U.S.] election, Israel will likely have a wider margin vis-à-vis Iran and its proxies. However, Jerusalem should not underestimate how similar Republican impulses toward Lebanon are to those of Team Obama, even if their ostensible motives are different.

In October, a young Mauritanian national murdered an Orthodox Jewish man on his way to synagogue in Chicago. This alone should be sufficient sign of the rising dangers of anti-Semitism. Nathan Diament explains how the Anti-Semitism Awareness Act (AAA) can, if passed, make American Jews safer:

We were off to a promising start when the AAA sailed through the House of Representatives in the spring by a generous vote of 320 to 91, and 30 senators from both sides of the aisle jumped to sponsor the Senate version. Then the bill ground to a halt.

Fearful of antagonizing their left-wing activist base and putting vulnerable senators on the record, especially right before the November election, Democrats delayed bringing the AAA to the Senate floor for a vote. Now, the election is over, but the political games continue.

You can’t combat anti-Semitism if you can’t—or won’t—define it. Modern anti-Semites hide their hate behind virulent anti-Zionism. . . . The Anti-Semitism Awareness Act targets this loophole by codifying that the Department of Education must use the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of anti-Semitism in its application of Title VI.