While the UN Security Council once again gathered to condemn Israeli “settlements,” the United States made clear it sees the entire exercise as a dead end.
Jennifer Locetta, the US alternative representative for special political affairs to the United Nations, dismissed the council’s quarterly debate on Resolution 2334 as political theater that does nothing to advance peace.
Sessions focused on the resolution, which labels Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria and eastern Jerusalem illegal, “only distract from pressing threats to international peace and security,” she said.
Instead, Locetta pointed to Security Council Resolution 2803, passed unanimously last month, which gives legal force to US President Donald Trump’s Israel‑Hamas peace plan. That resolution, she said, “charts the path toward a stable, safe and prosperous Middle East.”
“We are working with partners to stand up the International Stabilization Force and train fully vetted Palestinian Police, not rehashing decades of failed policies,” Locetta told the council, referring to the international force intended to help stabilize Gaza during a transitional period. “This council should recognize and end its outsized focus on an outdated resolution.”
At the same time, Locetta stressed that Washington has drawn clear red lines regarding so-called “settler violence” and unilateral political moves.
Trump, she said, “has been perfectly clear that the United States expects the violence in the West Bank [sic] to end, and that the United States will not allow the annexation of the West Bank.”
France’s UN ambassador Jérôme Bonnafont seemed unmoved by Locetta’s remarks and sharply reiterated Paris’s opposition to Israeli policy, declaring, “We reiterate our condemnation of the expansion of settlements and our opposition to any form of annexation of the West Bank, whether it’s partial, total or de facto.”
Russia echoed similar themes. Deputy UN envoy Dmitry Polyanskiy argued that “the long‑anticipated ceasefire in Gaza did not usher in alleviation of the plight of the residents of the West Bank,” and called for a two‑state solution as well as the release of Palestinian Authority tax revenues that Israel withholds because the PA funds terrorism.
Several council members also criticized Israel’s efforts to shut down UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, despite extensive evidence of its ties to Hamas. Loretta stressed that so long as UNRWA rejects “reasonable standards for accountability,” it will be seen as a hostile body by the Trump administration.
Obsession with Israel fuels antisemitism
Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, said that more than being a waste of time, the moral confusion and misplaced priorities of the council were contributing to the rise of Jew-hatred around the world.
By obsessing over narratives that paint Israel as the villain and its conflict with the Palestinian Arabs as the world’s most critical social justice battlefield, the UN was legitimizing antisemitic sentiment that can only end in violence.
Danon blasted what he called the “hypocrisy and imbalance” behind the UN’s “obsessive debates” over Israel’s right to defend itself — debates that, he argued, ignore the real consequences of incitement.
He pointed directly to Sunday’s Islamist massacre at a Hanukkah celebration in Sydney, Australia.
“This attack did not come out of nowhere,” the ambassador said. “From the steps of the Opera House to the arches of the Harbour Bridge, incitement was visible. Hate was normalized.”
“Inflammatory slogans were dismissed when calls to globalize the Intifada were shouted openly,” Danon added. “Also here in the city of New York, when hate speech is tolerated and when lies and media distortion are allowed to prevail, violence does not stay theoretical.”
For Washington and Jerusalem, the message was blunt: obsessing over Jewish “settlements” may score diplomatic points, but it does nothing to confront terrorism, antisemitism, or the forces actively undermining peace on the ground.
And, they warned, the cost of pretending otherwise is already being paid in blood.
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