What This Week at the UN Demands of Israel and Us
#1341 September 27, 2026
It’s not enough for us grassroots U.S. Jews personally to take umbrage at so many delegates walking out of the UN when Bibi got up to give his Israel-and-Jew-respecting speech. We have to openly stand by our people’s homeland and demand organizations and parties that seek our support do so.
What This Week at the UN Demands of Israel and Us
This Week at the UN
Ok, I took it personally as an affront to all Jews back in 2024 when Vice President Kamala Harris, along with my own Congresswoman, Mad Dean, absented themselves when duly invited Israel Prime Minister Netanyahu addressed the American Congress.
But then came this past week at the UN. When Bibi got up to speak, it seemed most delegates stood up and walked out. The Secretary General called Israel’s Gaza conduct the world’s worst mass killings since that meteorite wiped out the dinosaurs. Macron pooh-poohed Hamas’ terror in Judea-Samaria. (Bibi reminded him that just three days before a French citizen had been gunned down by a Hamas terrorist in Judea.) Abbas, Erdogan and many other world leaders hammered Israel.
Abbas Pushes “Two-States”; Here’s Why
What Abbas said merits attention. BBC:
“… Abbas told the UN that Israeli policies – in particular the illegal expansion of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank – threatened ‘the very life and existence of the Palestinian people on their homeland’.
“He also said it jeopardised the two-state solution, which is an internationally backed formula for peace between Israel and the Palestinians.” [emphasis added]
Want to know why Abbas champions “two-states”? In his autobiography Bibi, p. 241, Netanyahu quotes Arafat’s deputy, Abu Iyad, explaining their “Phased Plan”:
“We cannot achieve the strategic goal of a Palestinian state in all of Palestine without first establishing a Palestinian state [on part of it].”
And then he quotes Arafat:
“The Palestinian people’s struggle will continue until the complete liberation of the Palestinian land…. The Palestinian people’s struggle ought to be assisted until the complete liberation of Palestine from the River to the Sea.” [emphasis added]
The Task of American Jews – Leaders and Laymen
It comes down to this: We American Jews – leaders and lay people – have to stand up for Israel. As ZOA’s Mort Klein put it after Oct. 7 (ZOA posting, What Does It Mean To Be Pro-Israel in 2025), “promoting a Palestinian Arab state is not a pro-Israel position.” By me, it would shrink our people’s Jewish national home into an indefensible, Jewishly meaningless sans Jerusalem and Judea-Samaria Jewish national ghetto. But here’s where we U.S. Jews today stand:
Our Leaders
Let’s start with our leaders. In last week’s #1340, I criticized world Jewish leaders’ just issued J50 Declaration in Jerusalem defending Zionism for not going far enough by not expressly declaring that historic Jerusalem and Judea-Samaria aren’t “occupied Palestinian territory,” aren’t “disputed” [the world doesn’t call them “disputed”], but Ours. I ventured the following on cause and effect:
“Ask yourself, what would ‘Zionism’ be without historic Jerusalem and Judea-Samaria biblical hill country heartland? And, even if you don’t buy what part of Israel is the Jewishly meaningful, would not reducing our people’s Jewish national home into a nine miles wide in the lowland middle literally overlooked by Arab-sovereignty highland reduce it to a Jewish national ghetto?
“My guess is this sweeping declaration affirming Zionism as an integral component of Jewish identity omitted Jerusalem and Judea-Samaria heartland because so many of our Diaspora Jews, including here in America, personally, and hence their organizations, advocate or at least acquiesce in this fatal “’two-state solution.’”
Alas, it’s more than a “guess.” Afterwards, in responding to a posted reader’s comment that if the Declaration had expressly mentioned Judea-Samaria most of the U.S. signatories would not have signed on, I looked up their records on “two-states.” Of the six U,S. signatories, three were Jewish Federations of North America, ADL and AJC. Here’s their record:
*** All three were included by Haaretz in a 6/2/19 article titled Two-State Solution: U.S. Jews Won’t Budge. Will It Cost Them Their Relationship With Israel, as being “in lockstep agreement that a two-state solution is a declared goal to securing a Jewish and democratic state.”
*** AJC along with Reform was headlined by TOI 7/22/18 as “Bitterly Criticizing” Israel’s then new Nation State Law declaring “The land of Israel is the historical homeland of the Jewish people, in which the State of Israel was established,” defining the Star of David, the menorah and Hatikvah as the nation’s flag, emblem and anthem, and its language as Hebrew with Arabic having “special status.”
*** JTA on 4/12/19 cited ADL as having co-signed an open letter calling for two-states “hewing precisely” to the 1967 lines save for agreed “territorial adjustments” thereto, and opposing Israeli “annexation” in “the West Bank.”
Us U.S. Jewish Grassroots
If you felt aggrieved seeing so many nations’ representatives middle-finger Israel’s PM this week at the UN, if you appreciate why the Palestinian Authority’s Abbas pushes “two-states,” if you understand how “the two-state solution” would devastate, nay destroy, our people’s Jewish national home and return all of us to stateless persecuted days, stand up for Israel and us and demand our organizations and political parties do so.
JEFF LUDWIG:
Like many American Jews I embraced the two state (non-)solution that evolved after Oslo. However doubts began to arise when I watched Dennis Ross, Clinton’s chief negotiator, being interviewed by Charlie Rose. He described the last minute call he received from the Arafat team saying they had “a few last minute changes.” Ross asked them how many changes they wanted. When they answered 49, he knew the deal was quashed. Then Israel gave Gaza and forcibly removed Jews who would not leave. This gift on behalf of “peace” was made by and overseen by Ariel Sharon who was one of Israel’s heroes. If he was advancing the two-state solution, I assumed it was correct. Meanwhile, the PLO was giving substantial money to the families of terrorists who were imprisoned or killed while murdering or attempting to murder Israelis. Meanwhile Hamas took full and permanent control of Gaza and started their reign of terror and of tunnel building in Gaza and upon Israeli settlers across the border. I went to a crowded seminar held by Mark Langfan at his apartment in Manhattan where I heard from Israelis who had been expelled from Gaza, but who insisted they would be returning. It was an inspiring evening which made it clear that a two-state solution was not a solution but was a distortion of reality masquerading as a solution. I prayed and prayed about the issue and to know God’s will, and was convinced that the restoration of Israel and its victories in many wars with its neighbors was no accident but was the operation of Divine Providence. He has a plan for Israel and the Jewish people which no Arab caliphate aspirations in the Middle East can defeat or change. We must unequivocally spit in the face of this seemingly endless desire of Middle East Arabs to dominate, control, and kill those who oppose them. Israel had this problem even before there was Islam. They had it when the Hebrews entered Canaan under Joshua. Only now, unlike then, they have an ally in the USA. The anti/Semitic zealots must be fought in the Middle East and in the USA until they are squashed like roaches in a bathtub.
DAN BACINE:
You know my view: 100 years from now, there could be a two-state solution. But only after Palestinian Arabs demonstrate that they have abandoned their “river to the sea” mission and that they accept Israel’s right to exist as the homeland of the Jewish people. The borders will not leave Israel with a 9 mile wide portion. Nor will Israel ever give up Jerusalem. I’m sure creative people can figure out the details. But not now. Maybe not ever.
In the meantime, Jews worldwide need to figure out how to deal with Jew hate, fueled most recently by the false Gaza genocide claim.
ME (Jerry): I think both attacks – “genocide” and “two-state solution” – are related and we have to confront them both (and “apartheid … occupation … colonialism” and all the other canards) by forecefully making our homeland case. Recall what UN Sec Gen Guterres said right after the Oct 7 pogrom, making the Arabs’ case: “not in a vacuum … suffocating occupation … their lands steadily devoured by settlement and plagued by violence … hopes for a political solution to their plight have been vanishing.” And what BBC quotes Abbas claiming now: “illegal expansion of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank.”
“Jews worldwide,” as you rightly group us, have to expressly confront the four canards [“illegal … settlements … occupied … West Bank”] in that one sentence, stop calling Jerusalem and Judea-Samaria “disputed” [nobody else calls them “disputed”] and expressly call them ours, not least in an internationally Jewish-framed declaration defining “Zionism.” And we must make clear to the world that Israel absorbed more Jewish refugees from vast Arab lands than Arabs left tiny Israel, and that Palestinian Arabs are the majority population of Jew-free Jordan, sitting on three-quarters of Mandated Palestine.
Months ago, an Israeli newspaper labeled “the two-state solution” as “unthinkable.” We have to agree upon and make clear that’s our position.
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DAN:
I love you, but you’re not thinking strategically. Most of the world hates Israel. Many of the most hate Jews. Some who hate Israel but not necessarily Jews seize upon the war in Gaza as their reason for hating Israel. It’s not that they forget what Hamas did to Israelis (and others) on October 7. It’s that they wrongly believe that Israel’s response was not proportional. (Among other things, they ignore how Hamas intentionally exposed Gaza’s civilian population to Israel’s expected response.) If the Israeli government had expressed a hope to someday live side by side with Palestinian Arabs, when the time was right (see my earlier email), that part of the world that hates Israel but not all Jews might be singing a different tune. Might, but not certain. But no downside for Israel, because my conditions aren’t going to happen in the lifetimes of anyone living today, if ever.
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ME: Dan, I love you too (ever since eons ago we were on the same softball team and you said I played the outfield “almost adequately”). But we have to agree we differ on how Israel and Jews should state our case regarding “two-states.” Beyond our historical, legal, equitable etc claims to the land of Israel (western Palestine), there are no natural geographical features in the narrow land west of the River for dividing the land into two states for two peoples. We have to say, and make the world see, we can’t/won’t compromise on that, now. That’s their stand – from the River to the Sea – and the world believes they have an actual exclusive claim to it, and that we too think it’s at least debatable.
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DAN: Your view has no chance of success.
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ME: Does yours?
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DAN: Depends on what “success” means. I’ll let you know in 100 years. Maybe by then, fewer folks will hate Jews.