There is no doubt that slandering Israel remains a major preoccupation of the United Nations—as evidenced by the recent General Assembly resolution condemning Jerusalem’s actions at the Gaza border while making no mention of Hamas. But Elliott Abrams sees signs that change is afoot:

The final resolution [regarding Gaza] passed 120 (yes) to 8 (no) with 45 abstentions. Who were the eight countries voting no? The United States and Israel, several Pacific island states, Togo, and Australia. Last year Australia’s government announced that it was through with unfair and unbalanced UN treatment of Israel and would henceforth vote against such resolutions in all parts of the UN system. And so it has done. . . .

In the General Assembly [debate], the United States introduced an amendment that inserted a condemnation of Hamas in the [proposed] resolution text. . . . Algeria moved to quash the American amendment, but, remarkably, the United States won that vote 78 to 59 (with 42 abstentions). That is an amazing event in the UN: 78 countries opposed the Arab position and voted on the U.S./Israeli side, and only 59 supported the Algerian [motion].

There was then a vote on whether to adopt the American amendment . . . : the amendment passed 62 (yes) to 58 (no), with 42 abstentions. In the UN, that is an astonishing result—a slim margin to be sure, but a win nevertheless. Because UN rules require a two-thirds majority, the amendment was not in the end adopted—but the voting pattern is far better than many past UN votes. And in this skirmish, all 28 EU countries voted with the United States. That’s the good news. . . .

Future progress will require more diplomatic work, by Israel and the United States. Additional votes can be changed, in Latin America, Africa, and perhaps Europe.

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.