In the past, such American statesman as Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Jeane Kirkpatrick have used their role as ambassadors to the United Nations to speak the truth about bloodthirsty tyrants, especially when those tyrants made the organization a platform for condemning democracies like the U.S. and Israel. By contrast, America’s current UN Ambassador, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, used a speech to the General Assembly last month to declare that “slavery is the original sin of America. It’s weaved white supremacy and black inferiority into our founding documents and principles.” Noah Rothman writes:

Thomas-Greenfield is presently focused on getting the U.S. back into the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), an organization from which the U.S. withdrew in 2018—and for good reason. The UNHRC is an organization plagued by corruption. It elevates miscreants like China, Algeria, Congo, Cuba, Pakistan, Venezuela, Russia, and Qatar to membership. It maintains a permanent agenda item—Item Seven—dedicated to the criticism of Israel. It elects people like Richard Falk, a 9/11 conspiracy theorist and obsequious apologist for the terror group Hamas, to oversee the situation in the Palestinian territories.

And, of course, the UNHRC appears to share Thomas-Greenfield’s assessment of America’s terribly unimpressive record when it comes to the promotion of racial comity and minority rights. . . . The death of George Floyd proved an occasion for Russia’s envoy to denounce the “calamitous state of human rights” in the U.S., and it allowed China’s representative the chance to denounce America’s “chronic and deep-rooted racial discrimination.”

The tortured effort to equate racial tensions, lingering personal bigotries, and even the illegal (and prosecutable) mishandling of minorities by police with, for example, the resettlement of an entire ethnic minority into reeducation and labor camps requires you to sacrifice even the most elementary powers of discernment. It isn’t enlightened—just the opposite. It is bafflingly stubborn and deliberately dense. Worst of all, it . . . leads its advocates all but to defend the actions of genocidal states. After all, who are we to judge?

If our objective is the advancement and preservation of human rights abroad, this sort of behavior only makes that goal harder to achieve.

In his inauguration speech, Donald Trump put forth ambitious goals for his first days in office. An additional item that should be on the agenda of his administration, and also that of the 119th Congress, should be defunding, and ideally dismantling, UNRWA. The UN Relief and Works Organization for Palestine Refugees—to give its full name—is deeply enmeshed with Hamas in Gaza, has inculcated generations of young Palestinians with anti-Semitism, and exists primarily to perpetuate the Israel-Palestinian conflict. Robert Satloff explains what must be done.

[T]here is an inherent contradiction in support for UNRWA (given its anti-resettlement posture) and support for a two-state solution (or any negotiated resolution) to the Israel-Palestinian conflict. Providing relief to millions of Palestinians based on the argument that their legitimate, rightful home lies inside Israel is deeply counterproductive to the search for peace.

Last October, the Israeli parliament voted overwhelmingly to pass two laws that will come into effect January 30: a ban on UNRWA operations in Israeli sovereign territory and the severing of all Israeli ties with the agency. This includes cancellation of a post-1967 agreement that allowed UNRWA to operate freely in what was then newly occupied territory.

A more ambitious U.S. approach could score a win-win achievement that advances American interests in Middle East peace while saving millions of taxpayer dollars. Namely, Washington could take advantage of Israel’s new laws to create an alternative support mechanism that eases UNRWA out of Gaza. This would entail raising the stakes with other specialized UN agencies operating in the area. Instead of politely asking them if they can assume UNRWA’s job in Gaza, the Trump administration should put them on notice that continued U.S. funding of their own global operations is contingent on their taking over those tasks. Only such a dramatic step is likely to produce results.