I don’t see any obvious reason to think enemies of Israel are more influential on the UN Secretary-General than allies. The US is on the security council and is the most powerful country in the world, and Iran is not. Although I guess for UN stuff that depends on majority vote (I am not expert to know what does and doesn’t) it is plausible that most developing countries see the conflict through an anti-colonial, and hence anti-Israel lens. But Israel is certainly not friendless in international institutions: most of the power in the world is either friendly (US, Europe) or probably doesn’t really care much (China, Japan).
Thanks for asking this, it’s an interesting question. I don’t feel confident in my answer, but my best guess is some combination of:
The countries you list as Israel supporters have many issues they care about at the UN. The US cares about North Korea, Taiwan, nuclear proliferation, climate change, refugees, women’s education, polio, piracy, Ukraine… In contrast, the enemies of Israel typically have fewer issues they care as much about, so their attention is more concentrated.
The more pro-Israel countries are not anti-palestine; both the US and Europe are major donors to both the West Bank and Gaza, and they often try to influence Israeli policy to be more considerate of Palestinian welfare. In contrast many of the enemies of Israel range from actively desiring the murder of jews to simple indifference to Israeli welfare.
You’re right that this isn’t a fully convincing argument. I’m significantly more confident in the problem of UN bias, which I think can be observed reasonably directly, than my diagnosis of the causes.
Please explain how a 120-fold difference in population sizes between groups wouldn’t yield any bias in the global influence those groups would tend to have at the United Nations?
I didn’t vote on your post, but I could imagine disagree voting to indicate disagreement with the implication that Muslims are fundamentally ‘enemies of Israel’.
Your first comment claims that the 120 fold difference in population makes Israel’s enemies more influential than its allies at the UN (which I disagree with), which is different to claiming that the disproportionate populations have “some” effect over the UN (which I agree with).
Religions are not represented at the UN, countries are, and the major forces influencing the UN in favour of Israel are the US and the UK, which are mostly not made up of Jews, and the main force influencing the UN against Israel is China, which is largely not made up of Muslims.
In other words, power struggles at the UN on Israel-Palestine are not really a power struggle between Jews and Muslims, and like lots of other geopolitics things are more of a power struggle between the USA and China.
I don’t see any obvious reason to think enemies of Israel are more influential on the UN Secretary-General than allies. The US is on the security council and is the most powerful country in the world, and Iran is not. Although I guess for UN stuff that depends on majority vote (I am not expert to know what does and doesn’t) it is plausible that most developing countries see the conflict through an anti-colonial, and hence anti-Israel lens. But Israel is certainly not friendless in international institutions: most of the power in the world is either friendly (US, Europe) or probably doesn’t really care much (China, Japan).
Thanks for asking this, it’s an interesting question. I don’t feel confident in my answer, but my best guess is some combination of:
The countries you list as Israel supporters have many issues they care about at the UN. The US cares about North Korea, Taiwan, nuclear proliferation, climate change, refugees, women’s education, polio, piracy, Ukraine… In contrast, the enemies of Israel typically have fewer issues they care as much about, so their attention is more concentrated.
The more pro-Israel countries are not anti-palestine; both the US and Europe are major donors to both the West Bank and Gaza, and they often try to influence Israeli policy to be more considerate of Palestinian welfare. In contrast many of the enemies of Israel range from actively desiring the murder of jews to simple indifference to Israeli welfare.
You’re right that this isn’t a fully convincing argument. I’m significantly more confident in the problem of UN bias, which I think can be observed reasonably directly, than my diagnosis of the causes.
David—there are 1.9 billion Muslim people in the world, and only 16 million Jewish people in the world. That’s a 120-fold difference.
Of course the ‘enemies of Israel’ are numerically more influential in the UN. This has been obvious for decades.
People who are disagree-voting with me on this:
Please explain how a 120-fold difference in population sizes between groups wouldn’t yield any bias in the global influence those groups would tend to have at the United Nations?
I didn’t vote on your post, but I could imagine disagree voting to indicate disagreement with the implication that Muslims are fundamentally ‘enemies of Israel’.
Your first comment claims that the 120 fold difference in population makes Israel’s enemies more influential than its allies at the UN (which I disagree with), which is different to claiming that the disproportionate populations have “some” effect over the UN (which I agree with).
Religions are not represented at the UN, countries are, and the major forces influencing the UN in favour of Israel are the US and the UK, which are mostly not made up of Jews, and the main force influencing the UN against Israel is China, which is largely not made up of Muslims.
In other words, power struggles at the UN on Israel-Palestine are not really a power struggle between Jews and Muslims, and like lots of other geopolitics things are more of a power struggle between the USA and China.