Monday, September 29, 2025

Part I

Netanyahu Before the U.N.: The Prime Minister of Israel Defends His Country’s Existence and Defense Before World Leaders (Some of Whom Left the Room)

Well, coming out of the weekend, I think we have to go back to Friday when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the United Nations. He did so without many people being in the room. Of course, last week was a huge week at the UN. You had all these heads of state, heads of government speaking. All of its political, all of it in one sense is rather pathetic. Nonetheless, it still right now is important. And it was particularly important that the Israeli Prime Minister address the UN on Friday, and he knew exactly to whom he was speaking, or you might put it another way. He knew exactly to whom he was not speaking. A vast number of persons left the hall there in the General Assembly before the Israeli Prime Minister spoke.

It was a statement of opposition to Israel, and I might just put a full stop there. And now the context is opposition to Israel in the context of its war in Gaza against Hamas, and in particular a complaint even to the point of international courts and others accusing Israel of genocide. But the Israeli prime minister was undeterred. He stood before those at the UN and he knew his primary audience was not there in the United Nations at all. His primary audience was in the United States, specifically at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, and he knew his other audience was in Israel. So his political future is in Israel. It’s what’s at stake in all of this. He is the longest serving prime minister in Israeli history. He has a rather fragile coalition, but even though that word’s used over and over again, it sure has stuck together during some of the hardest years in Israel’s history.

So I’m not sure how fragile it is, but at least it represents a difference from earlier versions of Netanyahu governments. And you have a very close relationship between the Israeli prime minister and the American president. You have a very close relationship between the United States of America, the first nation to recognize Israel as a state going back to the late 1940s. You are looking, however, at the isolation of Israel in the larger world community. So a number of nations recognized Palestine as a state. They offered official recognition to Palestine. This includes Australia, New Zealand, it includes Canada and Britain and France. Now consider how close those nations are to the United States. And this tells you how close this is now getting. You have the vast majority of nations in the United Nations now extending recognition to Palestine as a separate state from Israel, and that’s in order to bring political pressure against Israel.

It’s an inherently political act, and we’re going to take some time today to figure out what in the world that act is and what it means. What does it mean to recognize Palestine as a state? The bottom line, probably not much, but it is used as leverage right now against Israel. Is Israel on the spot in terms of its war against Hamas, its effort against Hamas and Gaza? Is Israel doing wrong? Well, let me just say a couple of things here emphatically. Number one, Israel has the full right and responsibility to go after Hamas almost by any means necessary. And that is because Hamas is dedicated among other Islamic terrorist groups to the annihilation and non-existence of Israel. This is the kind of threat no nation can ignore. Furthermore, Israel has learned some hard lessons about, frankly, bad policy and bad understandings about Hamas. Going back to the period before the brutal terror strike by Hamas on October 7th, 2023, Israel had at least adopted, if not a policy, then a de facto reality of accepting Hamas and Hamas more or less as the organizing influence there in Gaza. That is no longer tenable. Benjamin Netanyahu knows that the people of Israel know that. 

The big issue here, however, is what’s going to happen in Gaza. And well, Netanyahu is made very clear. He intends to press the military action against Hamas. Now what we have to understand is that that is just very, very difficult and it’s very costly and it comes with great injury to the people there, the Palestinians there in Gaza. 

Now, I said there are a couple points I needed to make. Number one, Israel has full right to prosecute its cause to seek to eliminate Hamas as a threat. It has pledged to do that. However, eliminating a terrorist threat is more difficult than a politician’s pledge may indicate. And furthermore, even when you might have Israel declare Hamas is completely eradicated, I would say don’t count on it. Ideas are very hard to kill. And that’s particularly true with murderous ideologies and the history of the 20th century, if nothing else, should underline that point very clearly. But Israel has the right. 

The second thing is we need to be very honest about how wars happen. And so the United States has a very sanitized vision and version of World War II, for example, when we think about America’s role in that great war, in the middle of the 20th century, the reality is that in the midst of World War II, the United States and our allies did things that under other circumstances we would classify as war crimes. Now at the same time, we were fighting Nazi Germany and in Imperial Japan and it was a fight for the existence of the United States. It was a fight on two separate fronts. It was indeed a world war. And it’s not escapism or evasion to say mistakes are going to happen. Mistakes did happen. And furthermore, there were some bad policies. There were policies the United States would never have applied, our allies would never have applied under different circumstances, and in particular holding ground that had been occupied by the enemy with snipers and all the rest, civilians are going to be injured. There’s just no doubt. Civilians are going to be hurt. But one of the facts of warfare, particularly in the 20th century, and this meant you have city by city warfare, not just say front by front, neighborhood by neighborhood. This is now city by city. Civilians are often those who bear the brunt of this kind of military effort.

Of course, it’s also true the United States and our allies had no choice. And it’s also true that there’s still a moral distinction between what America and our allies did and what for example, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan did. And that’s not just a moral evasion. I mean if you just say Nazi Germany, you are implying, you know something about the gravity of this situation and the genocide of Hitler’s ideology and genocide was just one of the grave evils of that regime. It had to be stopped, it had to be defeated. Another lesson learned in a previous war where an armistice that supposedly ended World War I, was at least in part responsible for the fact that there was a World War II and the United States was determined this one would end with total surrender, which it did necessarily so. 

Now just fast-forward to Israel’s fight against Hamas right now and understand that Israel is in one sense, very much in the same position. It had followed a policy of trying not to be at war and not to declare peace, but just to establish some kind of stability with Hamas in Gaza. That failed. That failed. And so there’s widespread support in Israel far beyond the comprehension of Western nations to see this through.

And it is true that in Israel, which is after all democracy, you have voices against the government just as you would in the United States of America. But one of the strongest statements made by Prime Minister Netanyahu on Friday at the United Nations was in opposition to a supposed two-state solution. And he said, it’s not just me, it’s not just my government, I’m paraphrasing him here, but he said it’s 90% of the people in Israel. And you know who made that argument convincingly? Who convinced the Israeli people of that? It wasn’t Benjamin Netanyahu, it was Hamas. In his address to the United Nations Friday, Prime Minister Netanyahu said, “Israel will not allow you to shove a terror state down our throats.” He went on to say that an “independent Palestine will be national suicide for Israel and that it will be a mark of shame for countries that supported it.” The New York Times then says a group that includes the vast majority of UN membership. 

Now, should we take that as a big thundering fact the vast majority of UN membership? I want to assert to you, we should not. It is a babble of nations. It is a babble of confusion. It is a heaping up of little countries and nations into one big ideological swamp. The United States in one sense has to participate in the United Nations. If nothing else as American presidents have understood, the United States has to stay engaged in order to have that veto in the Security Council to keep even more awful things from happening. But one of the things that marks the honesty of the presidency of Donald Trump is that he doesn’t play the game and act like the UN is important. He went to the United Nations and basically told him the truth.

He made them mad and then he left, which I think is pretty much his stated plan. But I remind you this is a bipartisan reality. If you want to see some really horrible things said about the United Nations, or different groups in the United Nations or other nations in the United Nations, all you have to do is look at the papers of American presidents from Harry Truman forward because virtually every single one of them, even if they might’ve been committed to some model of internationalism, they really don’t mean that internationalism. 

I want to come back to what Prime Minister Netanyahu said. He described the effort of the UN to shove a terror state down our throats. He said, “That’s not going to happen. 90% of the people in Israel are opposed to it.” Well, why? And the answer is, it’s virtually inconceivable right now, let’s say there are two inconceivable things right now. Number one, what in the world would a Palestinian state be? And number two, how in the world would it live peaceably alongside Israel? Now, back in 1940s and 1948 when the United Nations established a two-state solution of its own design with the establishment of Israel, and then there was to be a Palestinian state alongside it, the problem is that Israel quickly organized into a nation and the Palestinians never did and they never have. And even though successive American administrations have given a tacit support to a two-state solution, they haven’t really pressed for it because I think Americans understand, that the existence of such a state would be not only a threat to Israel, it would be a threat to the United States as well. And as I mentioned, unspoken in so much of this as the fact that I don’t think most Arab states won a Palestinian state either.

I don’t think Egypt honestly is real happy about having a Palestinian state right next door. I assure you that many of the Emirates and other Gulf nations, they’re not excited about it either. If anything, giving some sort of say verbal support to it, some kind of official formal support to it might buy some time. But I think it’s pretty well understood that what those nations might face is another Syria or another Lebanon. Those are different, but still very much threats or another Iran that I assure you they do not want.

Part II

Palestine is Not (Yet) a Nation: Just Look at the Criteria for a Nationhood and Connect the Dots

But I decided it might be helpful to go back in history and say, “Well, okay, if there’s the recognition of a Palestinian state, what in the world’s a state?” And by that we mean a government, a nation. In the United States, obviously we use the word state to refer to different units, but when we talk about statecraft and we talk about the assemblage of states that the United Nations are talking about nations.

And so in saying that they now recognize a Palestinian state, what are they saying? Well, generally the definition of a state, and I’m going to cite here, Rowan Nicholson, a scholar of international law at Flinders University in Australia. I mentioned him before. He said there are basically four criteria. Number one, a permanent population, number two, a defined territory, number three, a government, and number four, independence. Well, already you can hear the strikes coming here. I will also cite someone else. Now, let me also cite the New York Times and the Times also has a four-fold requirement for criteria, permanent population, defined territorial boundaries, a government, and the ability to conduct international affairs. So slightly different, but let’s just look at that list. 

Number one, let’s go to the Flinders University list. A permanent population. Well, I guess in some sense there is a population, a defined population. So yes, that criteria is met a defined territory. Well, where is that defined territory? Now, the United Nations and United Nations member states in citing the territory often cite for example, Gaza, the West Bank, other territories including East Jerusalem. Now, one of the things that really irritated me is that when I was looking at some standard materials, talking about how Israel came into possession and basically management of many of those territories, it said, for example, that Israel has occupied those territories since a 1967 war or since a 1948 war. Well, let me just clarify this. Israel didn’t declare those wars. Israel was attacked by combined Arab forces and Israel had to fight back. Israel gained that territory because it was attacked. That’s not morally irrelevant here, just stating that Israel took those territories, particularly the ones seized in the aftermath of the 1967 war. I mean, that’s absolutely ridiculous. That’s morally bankrupt.  Now, Israeli citizens have formed settlements in some of those territories. That’s a different issue. But when you all of a sudden have now the accusation that Israel took this territory after a 1967 war, a 1967 war, that’s moral insanity. Not going to put up with it. 

All right, let’s look at the other criteria. A government, okay, a government. Is there a government in what would be defined as the state of Palestine? The answer to that is don’t make me laugh. So is there a government? Well, let’s just say there might be a couple. Hamas had been in control of the management, elected you’ll recall years ago, and by the way, it’s one of the principles in much of the world. There’s one, there’s never another election after that. And so Hamas is basically, it was elected, but it has obviously transformed Gaza into kind of a terrorist territory. And by the way, this also means that the people, the Palestinians in Gaza are being abused and mistreated by Hamas. That’s definitely true, but eliminating Hamas is the only way to eliminate that problem. Well, what about in the West Bank? Well, there you have the story of the PLO and a political party called Fatah, and you have Yasser Arafat who served for a time as the head of a government, and it was basically known as the Palestinian Authority. Who is the head of that government now? Where is that authority? Where is that government? Well, the Palestinian Authority has a leader. The leader is Mahmoud Abbas. He was elected to a four-year term in 2005. Okay, he’s still there now. No more a four-year term in 2005. He is now as major media indicate in the 21st year of his four-year term. 

So you ask the question, is there a government? Well, if you call that a government, you’ve got a government. And why you ask, have there been no elections as would’ve happened in 2009 and every four years? And they say, because it just hasn’t been politically possible, but it’s another way of saying, “We’ll call ourselves a government. You call us whatever you think.” 

The ability to conduct international affairs that was in The New York Times list. Well, I think arguably they’ve been pretty good at that lately. But it’s basically, I think we have to recognize not that these nations, Britain and Canada, Australia, New Zealand, France, it’s not that they’re saying they have confidence in the Palestinian authority. It’s saying that they want to punish Israel. That’s the bottom line. That they want to punish Israel. They want to make Israel back down in terms of this military incursion in Gaza, I don’t think for a moment that Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, thinks that he has actually established a relationship with what is truly a nation. I don’t think that that can be said with a straight face. 

Now as Christians, we’ve got the hope for peace. We’ve got the hope for peace for Israel. We have to hope for peace for the people there in Gaza, we know that there are babies who are malnourished, there are children who are hurt. There have been many who have been killed. There are innocent people whose lives are on the line, but the moral question is how can that be resolved? Israel just backing out of this and allowing Hamas to get back in power doesn’t solve the problem. And that’s the strong part of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s argument. We didn’t start this, they started it, but we have to finish it. The hard part and the downside to Netanyahu’s argument is the fact that it’s hard to imagine how in the world anyone with a straight face can say that Hamas is truly finished. Weaker than now? Yes. Weaker than ever? Maybe. But toxic ideas like Islamic fundamentalist terrorism don’t just die. They get rebranded. Just look at other cases in the same region over the course of the last several decades and the lesson will be quickly observed. 

Or to put it another way, those who have willed the extinguishing of Israel, they’re not going to give up because of the destruction of Gaza. So this is really a very difficult issue for Israel. I want to concede that. I’m going to argue that Israel has the right to determine what it has to do to achieve its national survival. That does not mean independent of other moral considerations. And I think it’s a very, very dangerous thing that Israel has now become so isolated. Israel needs friends like every other nation, but those nations need Israel too. There are two sides to this, and that’s why it’s going to take some time to figure all of this out because France in truth needs Israel as a democratic nation there in that region.  And I think the French know it, but then again, I’ve never been a big fan of French foreign policy.

Part III

Should Israel Be Barred from the Eurovision Song Contest? The Question is More Important Than It Might First Appear

But while talking about these issues, sometimes it’s important to shift from say, military action and foreign policy to softer diplomatic issues that aren’t unimportant. And sometimes they’re very revealing, particularly of the cultural left. Okay, so just get this, the New York Times is reporting. Alex Marshall is the reporter on the story headline, “Eurovision to Vote on Israel’s Participation.” The subhead, “The Event’s Organizer will Hold a Meeting in Early November.” So what’s going on here? Well, the New York Times will tell us, let’s turn to the story, “For weeks, the world of the Eurovision Song Contest has convulsed with debate over whether Israel should take part in next year’s competition given the growing humanitarian crisis amid its military campaign in the Gaza Strip.” Now, hold on. I know you’ve had other things to think about, but evidently one of the most important things in the world you can think about is whether Israel’s going to be allowed to participate in the Eurovision Song Contest next year.

The New York Times thought this is worth a story. And in cultural terms, I think it is, and that’s why it turns out to be more interesting than you might think. We are told that broadcasters, “From countries, including Spain, Ireland and the Netherlands have said in recent weeks that they will withdraw if Israel takes part.” So if Israel is going to sing, then Spain, Ireland and the Netherlands will stay silent. They’re not going to be in the Eurovision Song Contest. “Behind the scenes, Eurovision organizers have been buying time hoping to find a solution that isn’t divisive, but now they got to make a decision.” This past Thursday, we’re told that the board of the European Broadcasting Union, which organizes the high camp event, said in an email that it would host an extraordinary general meeting in early November at which member broadcasters would vote on Israeli participation.

Eurovision spokesperson gave no further details. Okay, so you had a meeting of the nations at the United Nations. It’s the big assembly week at the United Nations last week in New York, but you’re going to have another assembly. It’s coming up in just a matter of days. It’s going to be the European Broadcasting Union, an extraordinary general meeting in early November. The broadcasters are going to vote on whether the Israelis may sing in the contest. All right, so I said this is sort of important. Well, it sort of is because one of the things we have to keep in mind is that life is lived out in different dimensions. Military, yes, politics, yes, economics, yes, but also academia, also the cultural community. The cultural community is really divided into different strata. You got high culture, picture the soprano on the stage of the opera, you can think about low culture and that’s popular stuff and the people at the height don’t think much of that stuff at the bottom. In the middle you’ve got all kinds of different strata of cultural achievement and you’ve got a culture of self congratulations. I mean, ask the people at the Academy Awards how important movies are. You think it’s the most important thing in the world. 

Go to other awards programs and let’s face it, if you watch it, you probably watch it just to see the embarrassment of it all and the self-importance of it all. Now, there might be some genuine moments or great achievement is recognized, but by and large it’s just one giant exercise and back slapping self-congratulations. So we know that, but guess what? People like to watch it. And at the lower end of all, this is the Eurovision Song Contest. Let’s just say this is not something that has the attention of Orchestra and opera directors and conductors all over the world.

This is not something that’s going to stop the cultural elites. This is a very popular thing, but popular sometimes means very political. And this is where the artistic community and the entertainment community and the broadcasting community tend to be far more liberal than others. And it also has to do with the fact that Europe is far more liberal on these issues than the United States to begin with. And so it’s a very real threat that they’re not going to want Israel to participate in this because after all, Israel has done things that they oppose. And some of them would even side with the Palestinians. And some of them, I think almost assuredly would say they don’t want Israel to exist, which raises the question of why Israel want to go there to sing. The popular culture being popular culture means that it means a lot to people.

And so it is very interesting to watch this kind of thing. I don’t know what is going to come out of the general assembly of the Eurovision people. That is the European Broadcasting Union, extraordinary general meeting in early November. Member broadcasters, it’s just like the statement, just like the language of the United Nations. You’ve got member states here, you have member broadcasters in a general assembly. You can see the procession of flags right now.

Part IV

The NYC Mayoral Race Gets Even More Interesting: Mayor Eric Adams Withdraws from the Race

All right, one final thought for today. It is very interesting that New York mayor, Eric Adams, has dropped out of the upcoming mayoral election in New York. At the very time, by the way, yesterday’s edition of The New York Times opinion page or pages came out with just a huge broadside basic attack upon the mayor. Evidently it wasn’t needed. He withdrew from the race yesterday anyway.

So why did he withdraw from the race? Well, he probably doesn’t want to lose. He is the incumbent democratic mayor of New York. But as you know, a very controversial figure been involved in all kinds of things, was eventually, well, let’s just say his legal problems were largely alleviated by President Trump, but many others probably remain. And he’s very politically unpopular in New York. He wasn’t going to be the Democratic nominee, the Democratic candidate anyway, because Zohran Mamdani, the Islamic Democratic Socialist won that nomination and frankly is wildly popular. So what’s really going on here? Well, there is probably pressure brought upon Eric Adams to withdraw from the race on behalf of another independent candidate. And who would that be? That would be the former governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo. Mamdani defeated him for the Democratic nomination, but the establishment in New York is scared to death of a Muslim who is a Democratic socialist mayor of New York City. Look at some of the radical proposals that he has suggested.

But the fact is that Mamdani right now is heavily favored to win regardless of how many candidates come up against him. And it is not at all assured that the people who would’ve voted for Eric Adams will now vote for Andrew Cuomo, rather than Zohran Mamdani. It’s going to be a very interesting thing to watch. We could be looking at at least in part, the political realignment of the Democratic Party in terms of urban populations and big cities because it is not just New York. New York’s obviously the biggest city, and this is the biggest race in that light, but there are some other similar races, particularly for mayoral offices. It’s going to be a very, very interesting. If it’s a sign of things to come the Democratic Party has a very interesting future. But of course, given American politics, that means in one sense we all do.

There is going to be continued political pressure on the other candidates remaining in the multi-candidate race to drop out so that there’s just one candidate. That candidate being Andrew Cuomo, the former governor who had to resign that office in disgrace. But nonetheless, he now is the one candidate who alone that is if he’s facing off against Mamdani alone, he might actually have some chance of winning. But even then, probably not much. So if you thought politics was interesting in your town, just to watch New York City for the next few weeks.