The Discrepancy Between Global Isolation and Imperial Hospitality at the UN
While 77 diplomatic delegations walked out of the United Nations General Assembly the moment Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu arrived at the podium, an Israeli leader with a prestigious international arrest warrant for war crimes and crimes against humanity was cordially invited to speak at the United Nations. The grotesque hypocrisy of the Israeli government and the United States was on full display at the UN: Global condemnation of the Israeli government and its policies has reached an unprecedented level, but the Israeli government and its billionaire apologists have continued to enjoy total impunity. The Israeli government will continue to enjoy complete immunity as long as state sponsors of terror grant them impunity by shielding them from both legal prosecution and economic sanctions.
5 Takeaways For Me
1: The Discrepancy Between Global Isolation and Imperial Hospitality at the UN
According to former UN Human Rights Special Envoy Craig Mokhiber, the UN largely fabricated the illusion of international support for the Israeli PM during his recent General Assembly address to conceal the unprecedented global opprobrium against the Israeli regime. While 77 delegations staged a walk-out, the Israeli delegation countered the empty chairs with “Zionist seat warmers,” including Jewish supremacist Alan Dershowitz, who was prompted to join the chorus of fascist chanting from the gallery and the floor. From the podium, Netanyahu declared his delight over the recent Hezbollah terrorist assault on Israel and, waving a pager, likened it to ancient Hebrew scripture ( Nzah is loasher, abbreviated as Neely ), which all Israelis know to be the Torah’s commandment to destroy Amalek and “not leave a living thing.” Inside the hall, Israeli delegates publicly insulted walk-out delegations with a mob mentality. UN ambassador Danny Danon, former leader of the far-right Betar organisation, used a Starlink camera to film Iranian delegates on the assembly floor, while another delegate noted down the names of delegations that had walked out in a menacing posture. Such impoliteness is a function of total immunity for an Israeli government that has slaughtered 400 UN employees in Gaza: The UN’s current ambassador, Gilead Erdan, wore a yellow star and shredded the UN Charter on the podium in a previous post as Gaza’s ambassador. However, the host country’s protection allowed an indicted criminal to enter the UN building as a VIP, while anti-genocide protestors were detained en masse. “Nothing pulls back the curtain on the proceedings at the UN as much as this spectacle of indicted war criminal Netanyahu receiving VIP treatment at the UN while the anti-genocide protestors outside the UN were arrested en masse.”
2: Rebranding the Palestinian Genocide as a “Startup” for the Wealthy and Influential
While corporate mercenaries attempt to rebrand Palestinian genocide as an investment, there are more relevant stats worth pondering. Speaking at a UN-convened “Board of Peace” function, Jared Kushner stated that he sees it “almost like the building of a really, really big startup” for post-genocidal Gaza. This “startup” involves destroying everything that is not a building so bulldozers and excavators can turn the Gaza Strip into a “moonscape” for the owners’ benefit. The UN Security Council gave the green light for this illegal enterprise to flourish when it approved the resolution with the votes of permanent members Russia and China, which chose to abstain. However, the UN Trade and Development Agency (UNCTAD) issued a sober report that exposed the true scale of the Gaza Strip’s liquidation:
Per Capita Output: The per capita output in 2025 is valued at $212, or only 58 cents per person per day compared to $1,454 in 2022.
Business Sector Destruction: 92% of Gaza’s economic units have been destroyed, and agricultural production has declined by 94%.
Mass Unemployment: Unemployment totals 78%, with over 90% of the working-age population unemployed.
Physical Infrastructure Destruction: By early 2026, damage to physical infrastructure has been valued at $35.2 billion, with total recovery and reconstruction needs exceeding $71.5 billion.
Mokhiber notes that the “Board of Peace” is not an official organ of the UN but rather an enterprise run by criminals who want to distribute the profits of genocide among kosher investors such as Kushner and Tony Blair. They are attempting to usurp the administration of a Palestinian homeland that has been genocidally liquidated through a process that violates all principles of international law and denies the Palestinians’ right to self-determination.
3: “Humanitarian Smoke Screening”: Berlin’s Disinformation Campaign Before the ICJ
Nicaragua filed a lawsuit with the International Court of Justice (ICJ) last year, accusing Germany of being responsible for genocide, apartheid, and racial segregation in Palestine due to its vast military assistance to Israel and the UN Relief and Works Agency’s (UNRWA) funding cutoff. At the ICJ, Berlin responded with an assortment of farcical arguments to resist jurisdiction. Berlin argued that no dispute existed between the two countries, that the charges were irrelevant because Germany’s military alliance with Israel began before it accepted the ICJ’s jurisdiction, and that the ICJ cannot rule on Germany unless Israel is present as a “third-party absent.” In addition, Germany announced a ban on new arms exports to Israel in August 2025 to defend its military-industrial complex against accusations of aiding genocide. However, Nicaragua showed that the Federal Republic was engaging in “humanitarian smoke-screening” by observing that weapon sales continued under the old permits, and fresh approvals for military exports began in November 2025. Furthermore, Germany argued that its humanitarian aid to Palestinians should exonerate it from accusations of aiding Israel’s program of extermination, a position that Mokhiber compares to Nazi Germany’s use of the Theresienstadt concentration camp as a showpiece for international visitors. While the Nazis used Theresienstadt to deceive Jews and foreign journalists into believing that the camp’s inmates were happy and prosperous, Germany claims it has done enough by feeding a few crumbs to the Palestinians while systematically exterminating them.
4: The Veto of the Truth Behind the Vetting of the UN Secretary-General
As mentioned in my video above, as the hunt for a successor to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres intensifies, the Israeli government and the United States are working to remove human rights defenders from the candidate list. The United States has used its veto to block the selection of candidates who have spoken out against Israeli policies of genocide in Palestine. Notably, prominent candidates such as the ex-UN Human Rights Chief Michelle Bachelet and Guyana’s Permanent Representative Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett were vetted out of the running or dropped out of the race because they refused to endorse Netanyahu’s program of Palestinian genocide. In contrast, Washington and Tel Aviv have promoted candidates who have cooperated with the Israeli government and violated international law, including the IAEA Director-General Rafael Grossi, who has been a willing agent for the US in the past, as well as Sigrid Kaag and Nikolai Mladenov, who have compromised their principles by chairing the illegal “Board of Peace”. It is no surprise that Washington vetted these candidates for the position of the UN Secretary-General, with the sole qualification being the candidate’s compliance with the US position on Israel. The main requirement, according to the author, is for the future Secretary-General to be “more secretary and less general” so that they may function as a “servant” for the imperialist projects of the United States rather than a genuine UN leader who might advance international law.
5: The South Africa Plan: Why Law Without the Streets Is Inconceivable
South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the ICJ will not reach its hearing until November 2027 at the earliest, with a final ruling expected in May 2029 – far too slow a process to halt the Israeli genocide. Furthermore, Israel and its enablers regularly defy international law, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu flying over France, Italy, and Canada – countries that have bound themselves by international law to forbid transit over their territory for Israel, a state wanted by the ICJ for crimes against humanity. Mokhiber recommends that South Africa follow in the footsteps of the anti-apartheid freedom fighters by developing a campaign that would enable it to extract concessions from Israel, as the apartheid regime was forced to do when Nelson Mandela’s African National Congress incorporated mass mobilisation and a campaign of divestiture, sanctions, and boycotts. After decades of campaigning, the illegal South African apartheid regime was finally defeated. International law is not a magic wand that can compel the compliance of corrupt, cowardly, and criminal regimes such as the Netanyahu government – this responsibility belongs to the ordinary citizens who must organise to enforce international law.
The UN Farce and the Civil Society’s Responsibility
International law is a convenient instrument for legitimising Israeli crimes and punishing token figures such as Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov, Russian President Vladimir Putin, and the hapless UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. However, it is inherently ineffectual in confronting actual power: a successful strategy to stop the Israeli genocide requires mass action on the streets and within corporations to pressure governments and businesses to confront the Israeli military-industrial complex and hold its leaders accountable for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
