With the exception of Israel, not a single Western country currently has an above-replacement-level fertility rate. American births have been in steady decline since 2008, and hopes of a coronavirus-induced resurgence of births have turned out to be misplaced. Wilfred Reilly comments:

As I noted in a recent article, . . . many members of Gen-Z seem to reject conventional dating and romance totally. Today, only 30 percent of senior high-school students have ever had sex even once, and only 21 percent are currently involved in a “sexually active” love relationship. About 20 percent identify as gay or otherwise “queer.” There are several possible reasons for the objectively rather-astonishing rise of childless celibacy as a trend among America’s young. Religiosity, which brought with it endless “moral” rules but also the formal duty to “be fruitful and multiply,” is on the wane—the fastest-growing religious identity in the United States if not the world is “none.”

But one additional and very obvious factor has received far too little attention in most past analyses of this topic. Almost certainly, one reason that many Americans—perhaps particularly urban liberal white women—are not having children is that they have been told throughout their entire lives that it is immoral or evil to do so. The extent to which this is the case almost cannot be overstated.

A recent large-[sample-size] survey found that fear of such variables as “climate change” influenced the child-bearing decisions of 53 percent of respondents. . . . [O]ne strongly suspects the people occupying Western civilization will figure out a solution to a problem like “higher sea levels”—rather than simply staring dully at the rising waters until we all drown. However, we may not as easily survive the downstream effects of our current fear of the rising waters.

Can the United States continue to lead the world? Sure. . . . But, to keep growing our population and retain our economic pole position while we do so, we will have to try something that we have not tried for decades—convincing our own citizens that having families is good. Suggestions on how to do that are welcome!

One need not be an expert in international law to see the absurdity of the ICC prosecutor’s determination that the leaders of Hamas and the leaders of Israel are equally guilty of war crimes. It takes only a little more knowledge to understand that the court has no jurisdiction over Israel, which is not a signatory to the Rome Statute, the ICC’s founding treaty. In a careful analysis, Avraham Russell Shalev outlines some of the many legal holes in this case, and observes that the problems are inherent in the court itself:

A review of the ICC’s relationship towards Israel over its two decades of existence demonstrates a fundamental bias and double standard toward the Jewish state. This bias is not a function of any specific prosecutor. Rather, it is an institutional feature, found even in the Rome Statute. . . . Israel initially refused to sign the Rome Statute as it became apparent that the Arab states had politicized the Rome Conference and introduced language that departed from existing international law specifically to criminalize Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria.

Therefore, argues Shalev, Jerusalem should deal with the case against it not as a legal problem, to which it would respond by dispatching lawyers to make carefully reasoned arguments, but as a political and diplomatic one. More specifically, he contends that

collaboration with the ICC will not reduce the very high chances of arrest warrants being issued against Israeli officials, but will give those charges great weight and legitimacy when they come. Instead, Israel must adopt a policy of non-cooperation and even offense.

And what does a policy of offense entail?

Israel has repeatedly stated that it does not recognize the ICC’s jurisdiction. Therefore, any legal proceedings are completely illegitimate and as such, the various legal bodies—the attorney general, the Justice Ministry’s International Affairs Office, the Foreign Ministry’s legal advisors, and the Military Advocate General’s International Law Department—will no longer communicate with the ICC. [In addition], the Knesset must pass legislation modeled on the American Service-Member’s Protection Act. This legislation would bar any government agency from cooperating with the ICC without a government decision.

While Israel has never accepted the ICC’s jurisdiction, the Palestinian Authority (PA) has willingly accepted it. The court can hardly turn around now and deny jurisdiction to avoid prosecuting Palestinian crimes. . . . Palestinian nationals, acting on behalf of Hamas, Fatah, and other terrorist organizations, and with no affiliation, have carried out serious war crimes against Israelis and Palestinians. Israel must publicly demand that the ICC issue indictments against them.