The UN is an anti-semitic organization

[Argus]

The UN spits out hundreds of anti-Israel resolutions at the behest of Arab nations who despise them. Now if Israel would only obey those resolutions then there would be no more? Absurd.

Not absurd. Perfectly sensible. The resolutions are clear, and they are passed by the member nations because they make sense to them. If Israel desisted from the breaking of international law, the UN would have no further basis for making the resolutions and the member states would reject them.

The situation is rather plain and clear to everyone but Likudnik apologists. The majority of member states of the UN think Israel is occupying Palestinian territory illegally.

The majority of the member states of the UN are ruled by murderers, thugs and savages. As such I could care less what they want or think or say. What I wonder is why you do.

[Argus]

The biggest obstacle for the UN in recent years has been the "hubris" of the United States. As TFB often cites, "The Imperial Hubris."  The US has actively worked at undermining the UN and has reneged on its funding responsibilities for years, most notably in the past four.

This is inevitable if you stop for a moment to consider the foundations of the United States as opposed to the United Nations. Both are imperfect organizations run by imperfect men. But at heart, the US supports freedom and democracy, and has long espoused and worked for the expansion of both throughout the world.

The United Nations, as was claimed above by one of its supporters, is merely the tool of its members. And who are its members? The majority are dictatorships who have no interest whatever in the expansion of democracy or freedom. Quite the contrary.

Naturally there is going to be friction between these two diametrically opposed beliefs.

What is unfortunate is so many people in free, western nations don't seem to understand this. They don't understand just who makes up the majority of the United Nations, or that this majority would clearly oppose anything which went contrary to their interests.

Most especially including democracy and freedom.

[Argus]

There wouldn't even have been an Israel without the UN.  If you could show that the UN is making false claims; you might have some understanding.  The resolutions against Israel are for genuine cause.

Mostly not. Mostly they are one-sided, unfair and posed by Arab nations who are, without exception, brutal dictatorships.

Clean up their own act.  We expect more from a country that is supposed to be a civilized democracy than we do the North Koreas where it is known that they are being run by egotistical dictatorships with no concern for the ordinary people.

Who is this "we" you refer to? Not we as in the United Nations. To suggest the UN expects more from Israel than it does countries run by "egotistical dictatorships" is to ignore the fact the majority of the members of the United Nations can easily be so described.

Without the USA's unfailing protection for its misdeeds; Israel would be facing serious sanctions for its actions.

And yet, oddly, North Korea would not.

[Guest eureka]

I think that it might help to clear your thinking if you read the Charter of the United Nations.

The UN cannot debate or pass resolutions that are contrary to the Charter: that is, that are not democratic in purpose and that do not pertain to the benefit of international society as well as conforming to the Human Rights standards of the Declarations.

If the more limited concepts of freedom and democracy that persist in the United States clash with that, then it behooves the United States to move into alignment with the ideas for a better world that some other members, as well as the Americans amongst the founders of the UN hold or held.

[caesar]

Who is this "we" you refer to? Not we as in the United Nations. To suggest the UN expects more from Israel than it does countries run by "egotistical dictatorships" is to ignore the fact the majority of the members of the United Nations can easily be so described.

Your racial bias is showing. Israel is a violent aggressive country under the present leadership. It is in violation of Human rights as well as ignoring UN resolutions.

[Black Dog]

There is a fair point to be made about the inconsistency between the UN membership's censure of Israel and their ignorance of other human rights violations perpatrated the world over. Are there a number of UN member States with an axe to grind against Israel? Sure.

But to take that simple nugget of information and use it to swing wildly in the other direction (that being Israel is a poor, persecuted innocent) would be disingenous, if not downright dangerous. Truth is, Israel deserves censure. So do many other nations. So the problem is not one of Israel getting singled out too much, but other's not getting what's coming to them.

At the end of the day, however, the resolutions passed against Israel are nothing but bits of paper. The Security Council would never approve of any action that would have tangeible effects on Israel or, if such were the case, any other human rights violators, nor would Israel or anyone else feel compelled to take heed, simply because national political and economic interests trump human rights every single time.

[Michael Hardner]

The Security Council would never approve of any action that would have tangeible effects on Israel

This is what I find so odd about this (mostly American) talk of UN reform.

Would the US, England, France, Russia and China still hold veto power after any reform ?

If this is really about reform and not dissolution, then do the proponents think that the US should hold sole veto power ?

[I miss Reagan]

How did France ever get vetoing power in the first place.

The United Nations General Assembly is largely a forum for denunciations of Israel. The United Nations Human Rights Commission has been chaired by, of all nations, Libya. The United Nations Security Council, by the veto of France and Russia, refused to approve military action in Iraq in January 2003 -- even though Saddam Hussein's regime violated Resolution 1441 passed only two months before.

What use is the UN?

[Black Dog]

It always cracks me up when right-wingers cite the oil-for-food program as an example of the UN's corruption.

The U.N. Oil for Food program, we learn from the reporting of Claudia Rosett in The Wall Street Journal, was a rip-off on the order of $21 billion -- with money intended for hungry Iraqis going instead to Saddam Hussein and his henchmen, to bribed French and Russian businesses and, evidently, to the U.N.'s own man in charge, Benon Savan.

The tale told about the alleged UN oil-for-food scandal gets taller with each telling. The U.S. General Accounting Office estimated that Saddam Hussein skimmed $10.1 billion under UN noses, but it was soon discovered that this included $5.7 billion in oil smuggling by Saddam for which the UN had no responsibility.

That didn't stop UN bashers from latching on to the higher number - until they found an even more staggering $21 billion cited in a U.S. Senate subcommittee report. But that included all of Saddam's illegal oil revenues going back to 1991 - five years before the oil-for-food program was ever conceived. Charles Duelfer, the CIA's Iraq weapons inspector, put Saddam's total illicit income related to oil-for-food at $1.74 billion. But don't expect to find that figure cited in the press and Congressional attacks.

The United States and Britain, along with the other members of the UN Security Council, designed and oversaw the oil-for-food program. The United States alone had 60 professionals review each of the 36,000 contracts awarded - more than twice the size of the UN oil-for-food office's professional staff. America and Britain held up 5,000 contracts, sometimes for months, to ensure that no technology was getting through that Saddam could use for weapons purposes. But they held up none - not a single solitary one - on the grounds of pricing irregularities, even when alerted by UN staff.

[Argus]

Who is this "we" you refer to? Not we as in the United Nations. To suggest the UN expects more from Israel than it does countries run by "egotistical dictatorships" is to ignore the fact the majority of the members of the United Nations can easily be so described.

Your racial bias is showing. Israel is a violent aggressive country under the present leadership. It is in violation of Human rights as well as ignoring UN resolutions.

My racial bias is showing because I point out that most of the members of the UN are dictatorships? Are you laughed at often in life, or is it just when you try to intrude on discussions where adults are present?

[Argus]

I think that it might help to clear your thinking if you read the Charter of the United Nations.

The UN cannot debate or pass resolutions that are contrary to the Charter: that is, that are not democratic in purpose and that do not pertain to the benefit of international society as well as conforming to the Human Rights standards of the Declarations.

The Soviet Union had a great constitution, too - on paper. No one paid any attention to it, of course.

[Guest eureka]

Do you know how motions are brought to the floor of the UN? They must pass through appropriate procedures and vetting to ensure that they conform to the Charter. The UN does not have the monopoly power of the Soviet government to enable it to override its constitutional obligations.