The streets are seething. Police have clashed with demonstrators and there have been not only arrests but some violence. Hundreds of thousands and likely millions have protested proposed government actions. Unions have called for nationwide strikes. Government reactions have elicited even more fierce opposition.

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Israel? No, France. Most recently, protests have intensified when the government completely bypassed the parliament to push through by decree a broadly unpopular provision raising the retirement age. In response, President Biden has said exactly nothing, and other figures in his administration – the US Ambassador to France, the Secretary of State, the Vice President – have been equally quiet.

"We remain deeply concerned by recent developments, which further underscore the need in our view for compromise," National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said on March 27. Why was he talking about Jerusalem and not Paris?

What explains the Biden administration's intervention in Israeli politics, where in fact the officials mentioned above (ambassador, secretary of state, vice president, president) have all jumped in? It cannot be the facts of the situation. In Israel, the government has in fact done nothing yet about judicial reform, while in France President Macron simply blasted through the protests to have his way.

There are four explanations, all political and all worrying. First, this dispute in Israel is in significant ways a contest between conservative, more religious parts of the society and leftist, more secular ones. That is obviously a generalization, but it isn't an accident that the chairman of the Knesset law and judiciary committee pushing the reforms is from the Religious Zionist Party. And neither is it an accident nor a surprise that a Democratic Party administration in the United States should be backing the secular left over the religious right. That is its position and in some ways its raison d'être.
Nor is it an accident or a surprise that the main media supporters of the Biden administration, such as CNN, The Washington Post, and The New York Times share those views and indeed push the administration into voicing them. Writers like Thomas Friedman have been vicious in attacking the governing coalition in Israel, and they have influence with administration officials.

One aspect of the judicial reform struggle in Israel is a kulturkampf between "advanced" sectors of society and those they see as backward. In American terms, Hillary Clinton in 2016 insulted the "deplorables" and Barack Obama talked in 2008 of people who "cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them." Rightly or wrongly, Americans on the left see the Israeli debate in similar terms and they know whose side they are on. It was predictable then that on March 9th, 92 Democrats in the House of Representatives wrote to Biden to demand that he "use all diplomatic tools available to prevent Israel's government from further damaging the nation's democratic institutions…."

Second and similarly, it should not be surprising that a Democratic Party administration will criticize what it views as right-wing governments and leaders in other countries. There has been plenty of official criticism of the Polish and Hungarian governments, and criticism from the liberal media of Prime Minister Modi in India. Meloni's victory in Italy was received on the American left as a dangerous move back to fascism, but leftist rulers like Petro in Colombia or Lula in Brazil don't evoke any alarm. Boris Johnson never got very sweet treatment from Biden, because he was on the right. As Politico put it, "Johnson was unlikely to find much comfort from Biden. The two men in the past had differences over both style and substance."
We've seen this movie before when it comes to Democrats and Israel. Jimmy Carter despised Menachem Begin. In 1996 and 1999, the Clinton administration intervened in Israeli elections to support Shimon Peres against Benjamin Netanyahu.

Asked in a 2018 interview whether it would be fair to say that he tried to help Peres win the election, Clinton replied: "That would be fair to say. I tried to do it in a way that didn't overtly involve me." In 2015, Foreign Policy magazine carried a story with the headline "Obama is Pursuing Regime Change in Israel." That time, it was an effort to back Labor Party leader (and now president) Isaac Herzog against Netanyahu, and the article concluded that "Both Obama and Kerry would love to see Netanyahu out and Labor's duo of Herzog and Tzipi Livni in. And they're doing everything they reasonably can – short of running campaign ads – to bring that about."

And that time, just like now, Netanyahu was denied a White House meeting while top officials met with Herzog. As The New York Times said on March 29 of Biden and Netanyahu, "There is no love lost between the two leaders…." When asked whether Netanyahu would be invited to the White House, the president replied sharply: "No. Not in the near term."

Third, the issue of the Supreme Court is especially neuralgic for Americans on the left. The US Supreme Court has long been a liberal icon in the United States, idealized by Democrats for decades because it was controlled by an activist majority. Democrats applauded decisions on such matters as abortion and gay marriage that gave victories the Democrats could not win at the ballot box. More recently, Democrats have attacked the Court because it now has a conservative majority. Democrats see that Israel's Supreme Court is activist and hands down "progressive" rulings, so they believe it must be supported. They sympathize entirely with the political forces that wish to protect Israel's court from Israel's voters and elected leaders. They are unconcerned that the Israeli Supreme Court can largely select its own members or at least veto those who are not members of the elite club.
Finally, it must be said that American intervention has been invited by many Israelis fighting against the judicial reform. They've invited it through their rhetoric, by saying that this American friend and ally was on the verge of fascism.

When President Isaac Herzog proposed a compromise, Ehud Barak infamously tweeted the old photo of Hitler and Neville Chamberlain with Herzog's face substituted for Chamberlain's. Ehud Olmert and a thousand other commentators used the word "coup" while yet more spoke of a "blitzkrieg." Opposition leader Yair Lapid spoke of a "journey towards destroying Israeli democracy." All of them spoke in English to US audiences, and in the demonstrations in Israel, many signs were in English as well – all to appeal for the intervention of American Jews and the United States government. In private, numerous Israeli leaders and commentators explicitly asked for American intervention, arguing that Israelis had reached a dead end and had to be saved from themselves. Such conversations, and the picture of an Israel about to collapse into a dark tyranny, no doubt had their effect on Biden and his administration.

And those invitations fell on fertile American ground for all the reasons mentioned previously. Take for example the words of Rabbi Eric Yoffie, long-time leader of the Reform movement. Writing in Haaretz on March 2, he said "I have never once lobbied against an Israeli government. But Netanyahu's judicial coup, his offensive against democracy, must be stopped. That means US Jews must do the unthinkable, and urge a strong American hand with Israel."

This is a dangerous precedent. When Clinton intervened (twice) in Israeli elections he tried to hide his actions; he knew they were indefensible if exposed. Now there's a new model that justifies and indeed idealizes foreign interference – demanding that the United States intervene in domestic matters in Israel in a way that never happens with respect to any other democracy.

Those on the left – whether Israelis opposing the judicial reforms or Americans wanting to throw Washington's weight around because their side didn't win Israel's most recent elections – should realize first that two can play the same game. It isn't hard to imagine a conservative Republican president in the United States and a left-of-center prime minister in Israel serving at the same time. Will conservative Americans henceforth demand intervention in Knesset votes, or in Israeli elections, because some proposed policies are strongly opposed on the right?

Judicial reform is about the most "domestic" or "internal" issue one can imagine. If outside interference is legitimate on that issue, are there any issues where foreign intervention, whether by diaspora communities or foreign governments, should be considered illegitimate?

As Israel approaches its 75th birthday in just a few weeks, one must wonder what those who cultivate American interference think of the Zionist project. Are Israelis to be "masters of their own fate" (in Ben Gurion's words) except when election losers can coax the United States government to jump into the fray? Is Israel to have a kind of compromised sovereignty that is subject to American whims?

The current struggle over judicial reform has many aspects. The decision of those who oppose reform to invite, indeed to plead for, American intervention in this complex and fateful internal contest damages Israeli sovereignty and self-government. One can only hope that when the dust has settled, Israelis will – whatever their views on the Supreme Court – come to agree that the appeal to foreign intervention over the Jewish State's internal political structures was a damaging mistake and a dangerous precedent.

Featured on JNS.org, this article was first published by The Jerusalem Strategic Tribune.

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Everyone knows that American Jews are becoming increasingly distant from and disenchanted with the State of Israel. Articles and books expound on this subject regularly. And everyone knows why: Israel's right-wing government and its policy of expanding settlements, and Israel's maltreatment of non-Orthodox strains of Judaism, are repeatedly mentioned as the key explanations.

But it seems that what everyone knows is simply wrong, and oddly enough, we learn this from none other than the left-wing Jewish group J Street, which over several election cycles has done post-election surveys of American Jews. This year's is found here. The poll found that Jews called themselves Democrats rather than Republicans by a 76-19% ratio, which is close to what many other polls have found. What did respondents say about Israel?

The survey asked, "Compared to 5-10 years ago, do you feel more positive, more negative, or about the same toward Israel?" The result: 55% said about the same, 26% said more positive, and 19% said more negative. Respondents were asked, "Does the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank make you feel positive about Israel, negative about Israel, or have no impact on how you feel about Israel?" The result: 48% said it had no impact at all, 32% said a negative impact, and 19% said expansion of settlements had a positive impact on them.

Perhaps most strikingly, respondents were asked, "How much have you heard about Israeli policy toward the non-Orthodox population, such as who can pray at the Western Wall, who can perform marriage ceremonies, who can grant divorces, and who can convert to Judaism?" This has been a source of constant controversy, especially with the largest denomination among American Jews, the Reform movement. Only 14% of respondents had heard "a great deal" about all of this, and another 21% said they had heard "a good amount" (whatever that actually means). But 32% said they had heard only "a little" about it and a remarkable 34% had heard nothing at all. J Street's poll adds those numbers up and notes in bold print that 35% say they have heard a good or great deal about the great controversy, while 65% have heard little or just plain nothing.

Those numbers cannot have made J Street's publicists very happy, nor can they cheer the propagandists who are constantly telling us that such Israeli actions (or more narrowly, Netanyahu policies) are simply ruining relations between the American Jewish community and Israel. But relations are not ruined and more people said they felt more positive about Israel now than said the opposite – with most saying their views had not changed. And the impact of the great brouhaha about the treatment of non-Orthodox Judaism turns out to be exaggerated. Of the 35% who have heard a lot about the matter, half say it makes them feel more negative toward Israel; the other half are divided between 22% who say it makes them feel more positive and 28% who say it doesn't matter. Do the math: While the treatment of the non-Orthodox angers some American Jews,  the great majority don't know and/or don't care.

That doesn't make any particular set of views right or wrong, but the J Street survey suggests that there is no great crisis in relations between the American Jewish community and Israel. Israel does have to worry about related matters: for example, views among those most active in community affairs, views among younger generations of American Jews, and views in the largest U.S. denomination, Reform. But the results of the survey suggest that the relationship between Israel and American Jews is stronger than prophets of doom constantly suggest.

This opinion piece originally ran in Israel Hayom on Nov. 16, 2018.

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Fourteen years ago, in January 2005, Mahmoud Abbas was elected president of the Palestinian Authority. For a four-year term.

Abbas is now serving the 15th year of that four-year term.

That 2005 election was actually a milestone for Palestinians. Yasser Arafat had died the previous November, and this election was to choose his successor as head of the PA. It was a good election – free and fair in the sense that the votes were counted accurately and people could campaign against Abbas. There were loads of international observers, including a U.S. team led by former President Jimmy Carter and then-Senators Joseph Biden and John E. Sununu. According to The New York Times, Javier Solana, who was then the European Union's foreign minister, said: "It has been a very good day. The moment is historic."

Abbas won only about 62% of the vote (compare Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi's ludicrous claim to have won 97% of the vote in the 2018 election there) and one challenger won 20%. Hamas boycotted the election but was not forced to do so – as we saw when it competed in the elections for the Palestine Legislative Council in 2006.

That 2006 parliamentary election was the last parliamentary election held in the Palestinian territories, and there has similarly been no presidential election since 2005. Abbas just holds on and on and governs by decree. He has now undertaken machinations that will, in fact, eliminate the PLC entirely, replacing it with an unelected PLO organ. The PLC has been dissolved by the Palestinian constitutional court – whose own term of office expired over a decade ago.

What Abbas has done since the last election, in 2006, is gut the development of Palestinian democratic institutions. There are excuses, of course: Hamas is too dangerous and might win as it did in 2006, Israel is to blame, and so on. But Abbas is essentially snuffing out all opposition to his rule and forbidding all dissent.

Last autumn, Human Rights Watch issued a report on the ways in which the authorities in the West Bank and Gaza suppress dissent. Here are the opening lines:

"In the 25 years since Palestinians gained a degree of self-rule over the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, their authorities have established mechanisms of repression to crush dissent, including through the use of torture.

Both the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza have in recent years carried out scores of arbitrary arrests for peaceful criticism of the authorities, particularly on social media, among independent journalists, on university campuses, and at demonstrations. As the Fatah-Hamas feud deepened despite attempts at reconciliation, PA security services have targeted supporters of Hamas and vice versa. Relying primarily on overly broad laws that criminalize activity such as causing "sectarian strife" or insulting "higher authorities," the PA and Hamas use detention to punish critics and deter them and others from further activism. In detention, security forces routinely taunt, threaten, beat, and force detainees into painful stress positions for hours at a time.

Solana was right 14 years ago: That moment was historic, in that the 2005 election (and the parliamentary election the following year) marked the high water mark of democracy in the West Bank.

As Abbas marks his anniversary in power, those who had hoped for positive political evolution in the Palestinian territories can only mourn the way he has governed, especially in the last decade. He has outlawed politics in the West Bank. Under the guise of fighting Hamas, he has banned any criticism of the corrupt Fatah rule and prevented any debate on the Palestinian future. Just as former PLO head Yasser Arafat soon eliminated all independent institutions when he returned to the Palestinian territories in 1994, Abbas has crushed the hopes that arose – after Arafat's death in 2004 and his own election in 2005 – for a democratic future for Palestinians.

From "Pressure Points" by Elliott Abrams. Reprinted with permission from the Council on Foreign Relations.

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Israel announced last week the discovery of several tunnels dug by Hezbollah and reaching from Lebanon into Israel. Their existence has been confirmed and has been condemned not only by Israel but as well by the United States, Germany, and the United Kingdom.

The head of UNIFIL, the U.N. force along the Israel-Lebanon border, was taken to see one of the tunnels. Reuters reported as follows:

"U.N. peacekeepers in Lebanon have confirmed the existence of a tunnel discovered by the Israeli military close to the Blue Line separating the two countries, it said in a statement on Thursday.

"The U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) is 'engaged with the parties to pursue urgent follow-up action' and 'will communicate its preliminary findings to the appropriate authorities in Lebanon,' it added."

UNIFIL Commander Maj. Gen. Stefano Del Col confirmed the existence of tunnels during an inspection with IDF GOC Northern Command Maj. Gen. Yoel Strick, describing this as a "serious occurrence."

These tunnels are quite obviously a violation of Israeli sovereignty, and a violation of the governing UN Security Council resolutions, 1559 and 1701. Those resolutions demand that the Lebanese government exercise sovereignty in all of Lebanon. Resolution 1701 "calls upon the government of Lebanon and UNIFIL … to deploy their forces together throughout the south" of Lebanon.

Resolution 2373, adopted in August 2017, extended the UNIFIL mandate. It added that the Security Council "recalls its authorization to UNIFIL to take all necessary action in areas of deployment of its forces and as it deems within its capabilities, to ensure that its area of operations is not utilized for hostile activities of any kind."

The existence of these tunnels, dug from precisely the area of southern Lebanon that UNIFIL is meant to patrol, means that this area is indeed "utilized for hostile activities." What then is the meaning of the UNIFIL response stating that "will communicate its preliminary findings to the appropriate authorities in Lebanon"? The meaning is that UNIFIL will likely do nothing.

UNIFIL is not supposed to be merely a means of communication, or the Security Council would have bought cellphones instead of paying for a military force. Moreover, there are no "appropriate authorities" in Lebanon or Hezbollah would never have been able to dig its tunnels.

The tunnels are hardly the only brazen Hezbollah violation of the Security Council resolutions undertaken right under UNIFIL's nose. Consider this: Hezbollah is blocking roads in southern Lebanon to smooth the path of missiles it is moving into the area, according to a report quoted in Israel Hayom. Then there is the village of Kafr Kila, just north of the Israeli border, where there is a Hezbollah headquarters and according to the Israelis about 20 warehouses with weapons, combat positions, lookout positions, dozens of underground positions. All this was built in an area supposedly patrolled by UNIFIL.

What is to be done? As I wrote in a previous post about UNIFIL and its new commander, "Del Col should test the limits. That will make Hezbollah angry, but if Hezbollah isn't vexed by UNIFIL's presence then we are all wasting a lot of money – $500 million a year is the UNIFIL budget – and effort supporting that organization and making believe that it is enforcing Resolution 1701."

This is a test of UNIFIL and its new commander. "Communicating" to "appropriate authorities" is a euphemism for doing nothing at all. Hezbollah is preparing for war. UNIFIL is supposed to get in its way. If it cannot hinder Hezbollah's war preparations in any way and is even ignorant of them, UNIFIL is a waste of time and money.

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Everyone knows that American Jews are becoming increasingly distant from and disenchanted with the State of Israel. Articles and books expound on this subject regularly. And everyone knows why: Israel's right-wing government and its policy of expanding settlements, and Israel's maltreatment of non-Orthodox strains of Judaism, are repeatedly mentioned as the key explanations.

But it seems that what everyone knows is simply wrong, and oddly enough, we learn this from none other than the left-wing Jewish group J Street, which over several election cycles has done post-election surveys of American Jews. This year's is found here. The poll found that Jews called themselves Democrats rather than Republicans by a 76-19% ratio, which is close to what many other polls have found. What did respondents say about Israel?

The survey asked, "Compared to 5-10 years ago, do you feel more positive, more negative, or about the same toward Israel?" The result: 55% said about the same, 26% said more positive, and 19% said more negative. Respondents were asked, "Does the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank make you feel positive about Israel, negative about Israel, or have no impact on how you feel about Israel?" The result: 48% said it had no impact at all, 32% said a negative impact, and 19% said expansion of settlements had a positive impact on them.

Perhaps most strikingly, respondents were asked, "How much have you heard about Israeli policy toward the non-Orthodox population, such as who can pray at the Western Wall, who can perform marriage ceremonies, who can grant divorces, and who can convert to Judaism?" This has been a source of constant controversy, especially with the largest denomination among American Jews, the Reform movement. Only 14% of respondents had heard "a great deal" about all of this, and another 21% said they had heard "a good amount" (whatever that actually means). But 32% said they had heard only "a little" about it and a remarkable 34% had heard nothing at all. J Street's poll adds those numbers up and notes in bold print that 35% say they have heard a good or great deal about the great controversy, while 65% have heard little or just plain nothing.

Those numbers cannot have made J Street's publicists very happy, nor can they cheer the propagandists who are constantly telling us that such Israeli actions (or more narrowly, Netanyahu policies) are simply ruining relations between the American Jewish community and Israel. But relations are not ruined and more people said they felt more positive about Israel now than said the opposite – with most saying their views had not changed. And the impact of the great brouhaha about the treatment of non-Orthodox Judaism turns out to be exaggerated. Of the 35% who have heard a lot about the matter, half say it makes them feel more negative toward Israel; the other half are divided between 22% who say it makes them feel more positive and 28% who say it doesn't matter. Do the math: While the treatment of the non-Orthodox angers some American Jews,  the great majority don't know and/or don't care.

That doesn't make any particular set of views right or wrong, but the J Street survey suggests that there is no great crisis in relations between the American Jewish community and Israel. Israel does have to worry about related matters: for example, views among those most active in community affairs, views among younger generations of American Jews, and views in the largest U.S. denomination, Reform. But the results of the survey suggest that the relationship between Israel and American Jews is stronger than prophets of doom constantly suggest.

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On October 4, the White House issued its new National Strategy for Counterterrorism. This is a long and welcome document and I want to discuss only one element of the strategy: the role of civil society.

The White House strategy correctly states that fighting terrorism includes "prioritiz[ing] a broader range of nonmilitary capabilities, such as our ability to prevent and intervene in terrorist recruitment, minimize the appeal of terrorist propaganda online, and build societal resilience to terrorism." It adds that "to defeat radical Islamist terrorism, we must also speak out forcefully against a hateful ideology that provides the breeding ground for violence and terrorism."

The view that terrorists have an ideology and that we need to combat it rightly permeates the document. At one point it says, "We will undermine the ability of terrorist ideologies, particularly radical Islamist terrorist ideologies, to create a common identity and sense of purpose among potential recruits. We must combat the resilience of terrorist narratives by acknowledging that their ideologies contain elements that have enduring appeal among their audiences." This is an important statement because it shows that the administration views the fight against terror as going far beyond kinetic or military action.

Here is the paragraph on civil society:

"INCREASE CIVIL SOCIETY'S ROLE IN TERRORISM PREVENTION: Through engagement, public communications, and diplomacy, we will strengthen and connect our partners in civil society who are eager to expand their limited terrorism prevention efforts. We will raise awareness of radicalization and recruitment dynamics, highlight successful prevention and intervention approaches domestically and overseas, and empower local partners through outreach, training, and international exchanges. We will also promote grassroots efforts to identify and address radicalization to insulate civilian populations from terrorist influence."

All this strikes me as quite right but it points to a problem the document does not acknowledge: Some of our putative allies in the struggle against terror view civil society not as a partner but as an enemy. They simply seek to crush it in ways that can only assist people trying to sell terrorist ideology.

The best (or rather, worst) example is Egypt. The regime there has underway a broad effort to destroy civil society. This began in 2011 with the closing of several American nongovernmental organizations, including the International Republican Institute, National Democratic Institute, and Freedom House. Their offices and personnel were accused of receiving foreign money, and in fact, because Egypt is a very poor country most NGOs depend on foreign money. Those now-infamous "NGO trials" continue to this day. While U.S. officials often refer to Egypt as a close ally, the United States government has not yet succeeded in getting the government of Egypt to drop charges even against the American citizens who were working for those semiofficial U.S. NGOs.

The repression of civil society goes much further. President Donald Trump himself intervened in 2017 to get Egypt to release Aya Hegazy, an Egyptian-American who with her husband ran an NGO dedicated to helping street children. Most recently, Egypt jailed a woman who complained about sexual harassment in Egypt, for the crime of "spreading false news."

As a Carnegie report stated, "In February 2015, [Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah] Sisi issued a law for 'organizing lists of terrorist entities and terrorists' that conflates any 'breaches of the public order' as defined by the state with terrorist activities. Once again, the use of vague legal concepts opens the door for civil society organizations, activists, and political parties to be included on the list of terrorists and terrorist entities."

Here we get to the heart of the problem: There is an important contradiction between the White House strategy, which rightly says civil society must be a key ally in fighting terrorist ideology, and a policy of destroying civil society. One more example: In Egypt today, there are between 40,000 and 60,000 political prisoners. They languish in overcrowded prisons where they have years to contemplate the injustices done to them while jihadis offer ideologies that explain why this happened and try to recruit them. Egypt's prisons are jihadi factories. How does this fit with anyone's counterterrorism strategy?

The new administration strategy is absolutely right to prioritize actions that fight terrorist ideology "to prevent and intervene in terrorist recruitment, minimize the appeal of terrorist propaganda online, and build societal resilience to terrorism." Countries that crush civil society cannot achieve this, so defending civil society should be a serious element in our national counterterrorism strategy – even if some of our allies think otherwise.

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As a strong supporter of the Trump administration's Middle East policy, I believe the president's recent decisions dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are correct – except for one.

Everything I've seen about the peace plan that is being designed suggests it will be a sensible, tough-minded, and useful contribution to advancing peace.

The decision to cut funding to the U.N. Relief and Works Agency was correct. As I argued here in Pressure Points in January, UNRWA appears dedicated to never-ending Palestinian statelessness and to ensuring that the "refugee" issue never dies. In fact, I proposed cutting UNRWA funding when testifying to the House Committee on Foreign Affairs in 2011.

The decision to close the Palestine Liberation Organization office in Washington was correct, and in fact, I urged that step in 2013. The PLO is not a state with which we have diplomatic relations, and the PLO has a long history of support for terrorism. Today, PLO funds pay terrorists pensions and rewards in accordance with the seriousness of their crimes and the length of their sentences; that is why Congress passed the Taylor Force Act that requires an end to U.S. funding of the PA and PLO unless payments for terror stop. They have not stopped. I proposed closing the PLO office in that same 2011 testimony to Congress and think it is long overdue.

The decision to cut aid levels was correct, given the refusal of the Palestinian Authority to stop its payments to terrorists and its glorification of terror, and given its increasingly authoritarian rule in the West Bank. I testified to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in support of the Taylor Force Act, and aid cuts, in July 2017. But in that testimony, I argued for one exception: Augusta Victoria hospital in east Jerusalem and the East Jerusalem Hospital Network of which it is a part. As I told the committee then, "I would make an exception for those hospitals." Defunding them does not harm the PA or PLO, does not punish the Palestinian leadership that is making terrible decisions, does not help Israel, and does potentially harm Palestinians who have no role in Palestinian politics.

I don't actually understand why the administration decided to cut the hospital funding, especially when the Taylor Force Act contains the carve-out. That law states that "the limitation on assistance under subsection (a) shall not apply to … payments made to the East Jerusalem Hospital Network." There is even a cold political argument for continuing the aid: In the context of wide aid cuts, the continuation of aid to Augusta Victoria would allow the United States government to say "our cuts were inevitable due to misconduct and poor governance by the PA and PLO leadership, but because we care about Palestinians more than their leaders do we decided to continue funding the hospital network."

So I believe the decision to cut the funding to the East Jerusalem Hospital Network was a mistake. Mistakes can be rectified, and in this case, I hope the administration reconsiders and provides the funds.

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This month the new head of UNIFIL took up his post. The new UNIFIL force commander and head of mission is Maj. Gen. Stefano Del Col of Italy, and UNIFIL is the United National Interim Force in Lebanon, established in 1978. Its authorized strength is 15,000, and the actual number of troops is about 10,500. Its mission today is set in U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701, adopted in 2006 to end the Israel/Hezbollah conflict. The resolution, inter alia:

"Calls upon the government of Lebanon and UNIFIL … to deploy their forces together throughout the South and calls upon the government of Israel, as that deployment begins, to withdraw all of its forces from southern Lebanon in parallel;

"Emphasizes the importance of the extension of the control of the government of Lebanon over all Lebanese territory in accordance with the provisions of resolution 1559 (2004) and resolution 1680 (2006) … for it to exercise its full sovereignty, so that there will be no weapons without the consent of the government of Lebanon and no authority other than that of the government of Lebanon."

Resolution 2373, adopted in August 2017, extended the mandate. It also added that the Security Council:

"Recalls its authorization to UNIFIL to take all necessary action in areas of deployment of its forces and as it deems within its capabilities, to ensure that its area of operations is not utilized for hostile activities of any kind."

It is a reminder of the strange world of U.N. resolutions that 2373 does not mention Hezbollah at all. While the resolution condemns acts of intimidation meant to prevent UNIFIL from fulfilling its mission, it does not mention who is committing those acts.

Resolution 1701 lists the specific things UNIFIL should be doing, all of which are meant to ensure that the Lebanese army moves into south Lebanon and is the only armed force there, and more generally that the government of Lebanon and not Hezbollah exercises sovereignty over and control of all Lebanese territory.

Twelve years later, as a new UNIFIL commander takes over, we should be assessing how all of that is going. Is UNIFIL stronger, and has it helped the government of Lebanon push back against Hezbollah?

Very clearly, the answer is no. In the years since the 2006 war, Hezbollah has increased its strength and especially its weaponry despite UNIFIL's existence. U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said this when resolution 2373 was adopted, according to the official U.N. account:

"Describing the status quo for UNIFIL as unacceptable, she said the resolution called on the force to step up patrols and inspections to disrupt Hezbollah's illicit activities. It also emphasized that UNIFIL could assist the Lebanese Armed Forces to secure the border and halt the flow of weapons, and required it to report where, when and why it could not see behind roadblocks. The resolution demanded that UNIFIL step up its efforts at a moment when Hezbollah was stepping up theirs."

Cynics, or realists, might well argue that UNIFIL provides Hezbollah with a multinational force of human shields. That is, because Hezbollah and UNIFIL troops are so close to each other physically, it would be very difficult for Israel, in another war with Hezbollah, to attack without UNIFIL getting in the way.

Moreover, one need not wait for another round of fighting to see the deleterious political effect of UNIFIL on the policies of contributor nations. Among the top 10 troop contributors are France, Spain, Italy, China, Ireland, and China; other contributors include Austria, Finland, Germany, and Greece. Most of these governments are concerned above all about the safety of their troops, which means they do not want UNIFIL challenging Hezbollah. On the contrary, they wish to achieve a modus vivendi with that terrorist organization. That is one reason for the complaint, sometimes heard in southern Lebanon, that UNIFIL hires mostly pro-Hezbollah people for their local support staff and as providers of other goods and services. That keeps the peace with Hezbollah, at the cost of subsidizing Hezbollah financially.

What would happen in southern Lebanon if UNIFIL became more aggressive in enforcing U.N. resolutions? There would be some confrontations with Hezbollah supporters and perhaps even with heavily armed terrorist groups. Hezbollah does intimidate, block, and deter UNIFIL; there is no evidence that UNIFIL intimidates, blocks, or deters Hezbollah. The most recent incident occurred just a few weeks ago, in August, when "civilians" in a Hezbollah-controlled area stopped a UNIFIL patrol from advancing. Last year Hezbollah similarly let UNIFIL know who's boss. AFP reported that "groups of civilians attacked United Nations peacekeepers on patrol in two incidents in southern Lebanon on Friday, damaging their vehicles but causing no injuries, the mission said in a statement. The U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) said two patrols … in south Lebanon were obstructed on Friday morning 'by groups of aggressive men.'" UNIFIL stated that "civilians attempted to block the way of UNIFIL patrols and attacked the peacekeepers," and while no peacekeepers were injured in the incidents there was "severe damages" to UNIFIL vehicles. Just a friendly Hezbollah reminder.

What is to be done? Israel's former ambassador to the United Nations, Ron Prosor, commented that UNIFIL should push back: UNIFIL should "use the tools the force already has, like drones that can monitor Hezbollah's activities and relay the footage to control rooms around the world, with almost zero risk for troops on the ground."

But that is not what troop contributor governments seek, so it is very unlikely to happen. Still, one may hope that General Del Col is somewhat tougher than his predecessor, the Irish General Michael Beary. It is almost impossible that he will be less tough. Del Col should, and perhaps he may, try to establish new limits to the ability of the terrorists to treat southern Lebanon as their domain.

What would happen if UNIFIL folded, and the troops went home? Given that the presence of the UNIFIL forces is beneficial to residents of southern Lebanon – the troops can limit Hezbollah's absolute sovereignty there, and they do spend money there as well – their departure would be unpopular and would be blamed on Hezbollah. Shia residents of south Lebanon, who are already unhappy with the sacrifices Hezbollah is forcing upon them in the war in Syria, would have another grievance against the Hezbollah leadership. That gives Gen. Del Col and UNIFIL some space to work, make demands, and stand up for themselves. Presumably, both the Lebanese and Israeli governments prefer to have UNIFIL there as a sort of buffer, but at least in the Israeli case they would clearly like an active buffer that actually tries to do what Resolution 1701 requires of it.

Del Col should test the limits. That will make Hezbollah angry, but if Hezbollah isn't vexed by UNIFIL's presence then we are all wasting a lot of money – $500 million a year is the UNIFIL budget – and effort supporting that organization and making believe that it is enforcing Resolution 1701.

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On June 13, the United Nations General Assembly voted once again to condemn Israel, this time for its actions against Hamas in Gaza when tens of thousands of Hamas supporters and terrorists stormed the Israeli border. The condemnation is not news, but the voting patterns are worth a look.

The final resolution 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 (Marshall Islands, Nauru, Micronesia, Solomon Islands), Togo – and Australia.

Last year, Australia's government announced that it was through with unfair and unbalanced U.N. treatment of Israel and would henceforth vote against such resolutions in all parts of the U.N. system. And so it has. For example, on May 18 of this year, the U.N. Human Rights Council adopted yet another worthless resolution condemning Israel. The vote was 29 to 2, and the two countries voting no were the United States and Australia. So the first thing to note about the recent General Assembly voting was the Australian vote: a rare show of principle and determination on the international diplomatic scene and a model for other democracies who all ought to be following Australia's path.

In the General Assembly, the United States introduced an amendment that inserted a condemnation of Hamas in the resolution text. Amazingly enough, the original text did not even mention Hamas once. Algeria moved to quash the American amendment and remarkably, the United States won that vote 78 to 59 (with 42 abstentions). That is an amazing event in the U.N.: 78 countries opposed the Arab position and voted on the U.S./Israeli side, and only 59 supported the Algerian text.

There was then a vote on whether to adopt the American amendment and again we won: The amendment passed 62 (yes) to 58 (no), with 42 abstentions. In the U.N., that is an astonishing result. A slim margin, to be sure, but a win nevertheless. Because U.N. rules required a two-thirds majority, the amendment was not in the end adopted – but the voting pattern is far better than many past U.N. votes. And in this skirmish, all 28 EU countries voted with the United States.

That's the good news. The automatic majority against Israel is indeed fraying at the edges. As U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley said, "The common practice of turning a blind eye to the U.N.'s anti-Israel bias is changing. Today, a plurality of 62 countries voted in favor of the U.S.-led effort to address Hamas's responsibility for the disastrous conditions in Gaza. We had more countries voting on the right side than the wrong side."

But there was plenty of bad news as well.

The final vote on the (unamended) resolution condemning Israel was, as noted, 120 to 8 with 45 abstentions. That's shameful, as are many individual cases.

India is the greatest disappointment. Relations between Israel and India have been warming and Prime Minister Narendra Modi has visited Israel – the first Indian prime minister to do so. But India abstained on the American amendment and then joined the jackals in the main vote.

In that final vote, the United States and Australia got the support of zero European countries. Many abstained (including Austria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom) while the resolution actually got an inexcusable yes vote from France, Belgium, Greece (whose own relations with Israel are supposed to be improving), Norway (once a friend of Israel but now increasingly hostile), Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland. Also disappointing was Canada, which abstained on the resolution. Were Stephen Hadley still prime minister, there is no question that Canada would have voted "no" along with Australia, the United States, and Israel.

Once upon a time but in living memory, the United States had clout in Latin America and Israel had many friends there. The June votes show that those days are gone. The American amendment (which, remember, had 62 yes votes) was supported only by the Bahamas, Barbados, Colombia, Guatemala, Honduras, and Peru. But Antigua, Argentina, Belize, Brazil, Chile, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guyana, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, St. Lucia, and Trinidad abstained.

Bolivia, Cuba, Dominica, Ecuador, Haiti, Jamaica, Nicaragua, St. Kitts, St. Vincent, Uruguay, Surinam, and Venezuela voted against the United States.

This pattern is bizarre. Hostile governments such as Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador are easy to explain, but the rest are not. Why do Haiti and Jamaica and several of the small island nations vote against us while Barbados and the Bahamas vote with us? Why did Chile abstain instead of joining Peru and Colombia on our side?

Several African votes are also disappointing. Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently visited Kenya and Uganda and relations appeared to be very good, yet both abstained on the American amendment and then voted for the final resolution.

The bottom line is positive: Israel's ambassador to the U.N., Danny Danon, commented that "thanks to the combined efforts with our American friends and our allies from around the world, we proved today that the automatic majority against Israel U.N. is not destiny and can be changed." Future progress will require more diplomatic work by Israel and the U.S. Additional votes can be changed, in Latin America, Africa, and perhaps Europe.

Hats off, for now, to Haley, Danon, and once again to Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Foreign Minister Julie Bishop of Australia.

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I've written many times about the British royal family's remarkable record of refusing to make an official visit to Israel while making scores of visits to Arab capitals. That will change in a matter of days when Prince William visits Jordan, Israel, and the "occupied Palestinian territories."

It has long been assumed that the royals themselves were not refusing to visit, but were (as is constitutionally required in the U.K.) following the advice of Her Majesty's Government – in this case, the Foreign Office. While we do not know what led to the current change of policy that permits a royal visit, it may well be the warming relations between Israel and some of its Arab neighbors. It simply cannot be argued these days that a royal visit to Israel will harm Britain in any way.

But leave it to the Foreign Office to try to stir ill will over the visit. Here is what the Jewish Chronicle in London reports:

"The Duke of Cambridge will arrive in the evening on June 25, after visiting Jordan.

"His first engagement, on the morning of June 26, will see him visit Yad Vashem – Israel's official memorial to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust.

"Accompanied by Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, the prince will receive a short tour of the museum and meet with a survivor of the Holocaust and the Kindertransport.

"He will also lay a wreath in Yad Vashem's Hall of Remembrance.

"After that, the prince will meet Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Rivlin at their respective residences. … Planned stops include the Mount of Olives, where the prince's great-grandmother, Princess Alice of Battenberg, is buried.

"The itinerary says this will take place as part of the prince's trip to the 'occupied Palestinian territories.'"

It gets worse.

The Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported that "when asked to comment by Yedioth Ahronoth on the decision to place the prince's visit to the Old City of Jerusalem under the rubric of his visit to the Palestinian Authority, a British Foreign Office spokesperson said: 'East Jerusalem is not Israeli territory.'"

As former holders of the Palestine Mandate, the British above all others should know that the Old City of Jerusalem was never "Palestinian territory." It was Jordanian territory until 1967 and has never been under Palestinian sovereignty for one single day. The British might have said the prince was visiting Jerusalem without saying more. To call a visit to the Old City instead a visit to "occupied Palestinian territory" is deeply and probably intentionally offensive – and plain wrong. It is one thing to say that the U.K. does not regard east Jerusalem as settled Israeli territory and that its fate will be decided in peace negotiations, and quite another to call it "occupied Palestinian territory."

This episode has made me agree entirely with David Friedman, the U.S. ambassador to Israel, that the United States should stop using the term "occupied territory" to describe any part of Jerusalem or the West Bank. Call it "disputed territory," which it certainly is, or just say "east Jerusalem and the West Bank, which Palestinians claim as part of an eventual Palestinian state." Legally, it is hard to see how land that was once Ottoman, then governed by Britain under a League of Nations mandate, then Jordanian, can be "occupied Palestinian territory" anyway.

The visit by Prince William has been damaged by the Foreign Office but it is still a step forward after 70 years of refusals to make an official visit at all. One hopes that during the prince's visit to Israel, someone – perhaps the chief rabbi – will tell him what was the fate of east Jerusalem before Israel conquered it in 1967: No access at all for Jews, no protection for Jewish holy sites, vast destruction of Jewish holy and historical locations. The prince will visit the Mount of Olives. Perhaps he might be told what occurred during the Jordanian period, as described by the Jewish Virtual Library:

"All but one of the 35 synagogues within the Old City were destroyed; those not completely devastated had been used as hen houses and stables filled with dung heaps, garbage and carcasses. The revered Jewish graveyard on the Mount of Olives was in complete disarray with tens of thousands of tombstones broken into pieces to be used as building materials and large areas of the cemetery leveled to provide a shortcut to a new hotel. Hundreds of Torah scrolls and thousands of holy books had been plundered and burned to ashes."

Somehow I doubt the Foreign Office will apprise the prince of that bit of background about "occupied Palestinian territory."

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