On Monday, Donald Trump announced that the New York congresswoman Elise Stefanik will be the next American ambassador to the United Nations. Richard Goldberg has some suggestions about how Stefanik can not only push back against the organization’s anti-Semitism and many other evils, but also use it to advance American values and interests:

No month should pass without the council shining a light on the illicit conduct of China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and their key partners in chaos. China and Russia should be forced to veto resolutions defending their own malign activities and those of their clients and allies. For example, instead of waiting for yet another anti-Israel resolution to come before the council for a U.S. veto, Stefanik might force a vote on the UN designation of Hamas as a terrorist organization. Let Beijing and Moscow openly defend a brutal terrorist group by using their vetoes to stop it.

Next comes leveraging American financial assistance across the UN system to root out Chinese malign influence, to counter anti-Semitism, and to stop dollars from flowing to terrorist groups. [In addition], Stefanik should declare another policy: any agency that engages in anti-Semitism will not receive a dime from U.S. taxpayers. That . . . applies to groups like the Human Rights Council and WHO, which have standing agenda items to castigate Israel; UNESCO, which denies Jewish history; and the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which teaches children in Gaza and the West Bank to hate Jews.

UNRWA should be targeted for another reason: it is a direct financial pipeline to designated terrorist organizations like Hamas. But temporarily defunding UNRWA isn’t enough; Stefanik should work toward its complete dismantlement.

Even if the agreement with Hamas to secure the release of some, and possibly all, of the remaining hostages—and the bodies of those no longer alive—is a prudent decision for Israel, it comes at a very high price: potentially leaving Hamas in control of Gaza and the release of vast numbers of Palestinian prisoners, many with blood on their hands. Nadav Shragai reminds us of the history of such agreements:

We cannot forget that the terrorists released in the Jibril deal during the summer of 1985 became the backbone of the first intifada, resulting in the murder of 165 Israelis. Approximately half of the terrorists released following the Oslo Accords joined Palestinian terror groups, with many participating in the second intifada that claimed 1,178 Israeli lives. Those freed in [exchange for Gilad Shalit in 2011] constructed Gaza, the world’s largest terror city, and brought about the October 7 massacre. We must ask ourselves: where will those released in the 2025 hostage deal lead us?

Taking these painful concessions into account Michael Oren argues that they might nonetheless be necessary:

From day one—October 7, 2023—Israel’s twin goals in Gaza were fundamentally irreconcilable. Israel could not, as its leaders pledged, simultaneously destroy Hamas and secure all of the hostages’ release. The terrorists who regarded the hostages as the key to their survival would hardly give them up for less than an Israeli commitment to end—and therefore lose—the war. Israelis, for their part, were torn between those who felt that they could not send their children to the army so long as hostages remained in captivity and those who held that, if Hamas wins, Israel will not have an army at all.

While 33 hostages will be released in the first stage, dozens—alive and dead—will remain in Gaza, prolonging their families’ suffering. The relatives of those killed by the Palestinian terrorists now going free will also be shattered. So, too, will the Israelis who still see soldiers dying in Gaza almost daily while Hamas rocket fire continues. What were all of Israel’s sacrifices for, they will ask. . . .

Perhaps this outcome was unavoidable from the beginning. Perhaps the deal is the only way of reconciling Israel’s mutually exclusive goals of annihilating Hamas and repatriating the hostages. Perhaps, despite Israel’s subsequent military triumph, this is the price for the failures of October 7.