Almost since its creation, the UN has been involved in the Arab-Israel conflict, yet it has accomplished next to nothing in helping to solving it. Indeed, writes Mudar Zahran, it has only exacerbated it:

The UN, for six decades, has failed to produce any practical or feasible solution to the Arab-‎Israeli conflict, despite the billions of dollars that the U.S. government has given to the UN for ‎the purpose of advancing peace. Even worse, UN policies and practices have turned ‎[my] Palestinian brethren into lifelong refugees through the UN Relief and ‎Works Agency (UNRWA), whose largest donor is the U.S.

It is no secret that UNRWA has given a de-facto green light to Arab governments, including ‎that of Jordan, to abuse, isolate, and starve Palestinians so they would never integrate into their host countries and never ‎forget about Palestine. . . .

At the same time, the UN has always complicated the relationship between Palestinians and ‎Israelis by highlighting even the most minor unrest between ‎the two. This pattern of behavior on the UN’s part has expanded the conflict and killed the potential for peace.‎

Even worse, the UN has . . . attacked and compromised economic progress between Palestinians and Israelis by endorsing the boycott of Israeli ‎products, which results in [Palestinians] losing employment opportunities at Israeli ‎companies. This pushes Palestinians toward ‎hopelessness and radicalization and further kills the potential for peace.‎ . . .

The world must realize that we, the people of the region, Arabs and Israelis, can solve our problems without outside influence or UN involvement.

Two extraordinary events demonstrate something important about Israel’s most fervent adversaries. One was a speech given at something called The People’s Forum (funded generously by Goldman Sachs), which stated, “When the state of Israel is finally destroyed and erased from history, that will be the single most important blow we can give to destroying capitalism and imperialism.”

The suggestion that this tiny state is the linchpin of a global, centuries-old phenomenon like capitalism goes well beyond anything resembling rational criticism. Even if Israel were guilty of genocide, apartheid, and oppression—which of course it is not—it would not follow that its destruction would help end capitalism or imperialism.

The other was an anti-Israel protest that took place in front of New York City’s Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, deemed “complicit” in Israel’s evils. At organizers’ urging, participants shouted their slogans at kids in the cancer ward, who were watching from the windows. Given Hamas’s indifference toward the lives of Gazan children, such callousness toward non-Palestinian children from Hamas’s Western allies shouldn’t be surprising. The protest—like the abovementioned speech—deliberately conveyed the message that Israel is the ultimate evil and its destruction the ultimate good, cancer patients be damned.

The fact that Israel’s adversaries are almost comically perverse does not mean that they can be dismissed. If its allies fail to understand the obsessive and irrational hatred that it faces, they cannot effectively help it defend itself.