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<\/p>\nLegal experts and Israel advocates say UN bodies and international courts are no longer only judging the war, but helping shape the political battlefield around it\u00a0<\/p>\n
For Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, the problem begins before a vote is taken, before a report is published, and before another accusation against Israel becomes a headline. It begins, he says, with the world inside the United Nations itself.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI remind myself every time I walk in the UN that I\u2019m entering a dystopian universe, not unlike 1984, as described by George Orwell, where there\u2019s doublethink and doublespeak, and the truth is often erased and rewritten,\u201d Neuer told The Media Line in Jerusalem.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Hillel Neuer and Joseph Tipograph at JNS International Policy Summit, June 2026. (Gabriel Colodro\/The Media Line)<\/p>\n
More than two and a half years after the Hamas-led attacks of October 7, 2023, Israeli officials, legal advocates, policy researchers, former military figures, and Christian supporters of Israel are increasingly describing Israel\u2019s diplomatic and legal exposure as a front of its own. At the JNS International Policy Summit held in Jerusalem this week, speakers returned repeatedly to a common theme: Israel\u2019s military struggle is now inseparable from a parallel fight in the UN, the International Criminal Court (ICC), the International Court of Justice (ICJ), Western campuses, and social media over the language of legitimacy.<\/p>\n
The claim, as speakers across the summit framed it, is not simply that Israel faces criticism. It is that international institutions, legal forums, and public narratives can reinforce one another, turning reports into headlines, headlines into political pressure, and political pressure into mandates, court filings, and boycotts.\u00a0<\/p>\n
At the Misgav Institute of National Security, that line of thinking led executive director Asher Fredman to ask what was driving what he called \u201cthis campaign of accusations against Israel, claims against Israel, legal steps against Israel.\u201d His answer was blunt: \u201cThe United Nations is a central engine and catalyst\u00a0of\u00a0this campaign,\u201d Fredman told The Media Line. In his view, too many policymakers still treat the UN as a stage for symbolic resolutions rather than as a system that shapes budgets, mandates, commissions, elections, and legitimacy itself.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That diagnosis underpins a Misgav Institute report co-authored by Fredman and former Israeli Ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan, which urges the United States to move from trying to reform the UN to a strategy of \u201cDisengage, Withdraw, and Replace.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Fredman said Washington should stop presuming automatic funding and support only those UN functions that clearly serve American interests. He argued that Israel has made a parallel mistake by focusing heavily on bilateral ties while treating UN votes as diplomatic theater. \u201cPeople don\u2019t understand that the UN is actually really important, because the UN often gets to the very core legitimacy of a country, and that leads to legal proceedings, that leads to boycotts, that leads to blacklists.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
People don\u2019t understand that the UN is actually really important, because the UN often gets to the very core legitimacy of a country<\/p>\n
That same concern surfaced most sharply in the summit\u2019s legal discussions, where the central strategic question was whether Israel should keep fighting within international institutions or devote more effort to weakening their authority from the outside. The debate has only intensified since the ICC issued arrest warrants in November 2024 for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, while Israel has continued to challenge the court\u2019s\u00a0jurisdiction.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For Ron Soffer, an international lawyer, the danger is practical as well as symbolic. He described the ICC as \u201ca strategic threat to the State of Israel\u201d because, unlike UN bodies that issue condemnations, it can pursue arrest warrants. Alan Baker, a former Israeli ambassador to Canada who took part in the Rome Statute negotiations, said Israel\u2019s decision not to join the court had been vindicated. \u201cWe didn\u2019t make a mistake,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Others argued that Israel and its allies should stop expecting legal arguments alone to prevail. \u201cThe ICC is not a\u00a0court,\u00a0it does not function as a court, and we can have the cleverest legal arguments. It will not help,\u201d said Eugene Kontorovich, professor of law and director of the Center for the Middle East and International Law at George Mason University\u2019s Antonin Scalia Law School. In his view, pressure and sanctions would be more effective than persuasion alone.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The ICC is not a\u00a0court,\u00a0it does not function as a court, and we can have the cleverest legal arguments. It will not help<\/p>\n
Not everyone at the summit agreed.\u00a0Representing\u00a0hundreds of direct victims of the October 7 atrocities before courts, including the ICC, Yael Vias Gvirsman, founder and CEO of October 7 Justice Without Borders, argued that the legal arena should not be ceded to Israel\u2019s adversaries. The issue, she said, is not whether the ICC is good or bad in the abstract, but \u201cwhat place we choose to fill in this space.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
That divide carried over to the International Court of Justice, where South Africa\u2019s genocide case against Israel\u00a0remains\u00a0in the written phase; in May 2026, the court set November 22, 2027, as the deadline for South Africa\u2019s reply to Israel\u2019s written pleading.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Kontorovich called the case \u201ca legal October 7th\u201d and argued that, because Israel accepted ICJ\u00a0jurisdiction\u00a0under the Genocide Convention, the court now has a platform that could be invoked in every future Israeli war. Jonathan Turner, chief executive of UK Lawyers for Israel Charitable Trust, countered that disengagement cannot be the only answer. \u201cWe can say, until we\u2019re blue in the face, that its advisory opinions are not binding,\u201d Turner said. But unless Israel and its allies put facts before the court, he argued, the world will not hear the rebuttal.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Vias Gvirsman took the same position there, arguing that Israel should use precedent and evidence to challenge South Africa\u2019s case. \u201cIf we want to respect ourselves, we have a good case; let\u2019s bring it to\u00a0the court,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Nowhere did the debate become more concrete than in the discussion of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). In the United States, that strategy has already met a legal obstacle: a federal district court in New York ruled in 2025 that UNRWA, as a subsidiary organ of the United Nations, has immunity in US courts and dismissed the case against it, even as Israel has separately moved through domestic legislation to strip the agency of immunity in Israel.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In that litigation, Joseph H. Tipograph of Heideman Nudelman & Kalik argued that UNRWA is \u201cnot a refugee agency\u201d in the ordinary sense because, in his view, it perpetuates refugee status across generations. \u201cIf UNRWA is immune, it can do what it wants,\u201d\u00a0Tipograph\u00a0said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
If UNRWA is immune, it can do what it wants<\/p>\n
A similar approach has been pursued in Israel. Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, founder of Shurat HaDin, said her organization pressed for legislation stripping UNRWA of immunity in Israel after\u00a0representing\u00a0the family of a victim whose body, she said, was taken into Gaza by UNRWA officials in a UNRWA vehicle. When the attorney general later filed her position in court, Darshan-Leitner said, the new Israeli law had already limited the room for argument. The attorney general\u2019s position, as Darshan-Leitner described it, was that her \u201chands are tied\u201d because Israeli law no longer recognizes UNRWA\u2019s immunity in that case.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For Neuer, UNRWA sits at the center of the broader UN problem. He argued that the agency has become an institution that perpetuates the conflict through education, employment, and a political narrative of return. UN Watch reports released over the past two years allege deep Hamas infiltration of UNRWA staff unions and schools. UNRWA has rejected the broader charge that it knowingly enables terrorism and says it acts on neutrality violations when evidence is presented. \u201cIf we want to have peace in this region, de-radicalization begins and ends with UNRWA,\u201d Neuer said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The same institutional critique shapes his view of the UN\u2019s future leadership. While arguing that the next secretary-general will matter only within limits, because what he sees as anti-Israel machinery is embedded in mandates, bureaucratic culture, and member-state politics, Neuer singled out former UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet. \u201cShe already was the UN Human Rights Chief, and she had a very poor record,\u201d he said, arguing that she gave China, Russia, and other dictatorships too much room. More broadly, he argued that the UN should\u00a0operate\u00a0more like triage in an emergency room, saying, \u201cWe\u00a0don\u2019t\u00a0need a UN if all\u00a0they\u2019re\u00a0going to do is appease dictatorships. We need someone, we think, to speak out for victims, especially in non-democracies.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
We\u00a0don\u2019t\u00a0need a UN if all\u00a0they\u2019re\u00a0going to do is appease dictatorships<\/p>\n
That larger struggle was echoed by Israeli leaders. Foreign Minister Gideon Sa\u2019ar framed the issue in diplomatic terms, saying Israel must push back against language that turns accusations into accepted political categories while also building new alliances. Referring to a European commissioner who had called Israel an apartheid state, Sa\u2019ar said Israel could not treat such language as ordinary criticism. \u201cWe also, as a country, must draw red lines,\u201d he said. At the same time, he argued that Israel cannot spend all its energy \u201cblocking initiatives against Israel.\u201d Diplomacy, he said, must also be proactive, pointing to new Israeli embassies, a push to increase the number of embassies in Jerusalem, and what he called his ministry\u2019s \u201cLatin America year\u201d in 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n
President Isaac Herzog said Israel must \u201cemploy truth to counter the bias, distortions, and double standards spread constantly in the media, online, and across the halls of the United Nations.\u201d Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu framed it as another theater in a long war, calling the battle against delegitimization and antisemitism the \u201cEighth Front,\u201d and saying, \u201cWe will fight on the Eighth Front as well.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
From Mike Huckabee, the US ambassador to Israel, the message came in the language of faith and history. After outlining President Donald Trump\u2019s position on Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis, Huckabee described the US-Israel alliance as rooted in something older than contemporary politics. America, he said, is tied \u201cmore to Mount Sinai than it is to Athens or Rome.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/The-Christian-Israel-Alliance-Forum-at-JNS-Summit-scaled.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
The Christian-Israel Alliance Forum at JNS Summit, June 2026. (Gabriel Colodro\/The Media Line)<\/p>\n
At a separate Christian-Israel Alliance Forum chaired by Josh Reinstein, president of the Israel Allies Foundation, the emphasis shifted from courts and UN agencies to faith networks, media, and public advocacy. For Troy Miller, president and CEO of the National Religious Broadcasters, the issue is \u201cnot just about a battle that\u2019s anti-Semitic or anti-Zionism,\u201d but part of a wider struggle over Western civilization, Christian persecution, and the worldview that will shape the international order. \u201cIf we end up divided and fighting this separately, we\u2019re going to fail,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That point was echoed in more strategic language by Sagiv Asulin, a former senior Mossad officer and expert on influence operations and strategic\u00a0perception\u00a0at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs. Israel, he said, is winning militarily on many fronts but \u201closing terribly\u201d on the front of public\u00a0perception\u00a0and propaganda. After October 7, he said, he found himself thinking not only about that day\u2019s paradigm, but about \u201cthe paradigm of October 8th,\u201d and how anti-Israel demonstrations and narratives appeared so quickly on Western campuses and streets.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The media dimension came through most directly in Katie Huch\u2019s remarks. The creative director at New Beginnings Church and Larry Huch Ministries said younger audiences are being shaped by platforms where anti-Israel content far outnumbers pro-Israel content. \u201cSocial media is a problem, but it\u2019s also a tool, and we can use it to our advantage,\u201d she said, arguing for both digital engagement and bringing young Christians to Israel.\u00a0<\/p>\n
David Parsons, senior vice president and\u00a0spokesman\u00a0for the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, made the same case through tourism and public diplomacy. \u201cChristians come and leave as goodwill ambassadors of this country,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Military and political figures pushed the argument further. Col. Richard Kemp said Israel cannot expect to win without being blamed by audiences that begin from the assumption that it is illegitimate. Jonathan Conricus, a former Israel Defense Forces international\u00a0spokesman, said Israel has done too little in the information arena. \u201cIf you leave a vacuum for your enemy, he will populate it,\u201d Conricus said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
No one put the failure more sharply than former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett. Israel, he said, has allowed its public image to collapse in the United States and cannot rely indefinitely on the personal sympathy of any one president. \u201cIf Israel were a PR firm, I definitely would not hire us,\u201d Bennett said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
If Israel were a PR firm, I definitely would not hire us<\/p>\n
Even Neuer, one of the summit\u2019s harshest critics of the UN, argued that Israel can damage its own case. While he said UN bias persists regardless of the government in power, he singled out inflammatory rhetoric by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir as self-defeating. When Israeli ministers use language that\u00a0appears to celebrate\u00a0suffering, he said, \u201cyou lose almost all of your friends.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
For Fredman, that points to a practical agenda: tie bilateral relationships to multilateral conduct, condition UN funding, expose hostile networks, and invest far more in strategic communications. \u201cIsrael for years has not only been greatly under-investing in its strategic communications and public diplomacy, but on the level of creating people-to-people ties and cooperation with civil society, it has not received resources,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For Vias Gvirsman, the answer must also preserve moral limits. In her closing remarks, she described law as power, but power that must reflect \u201csanctity of life\u201d and \u201chuman dignity.\u201d The question, she said, is \u201chow do we fight a battle we cannot lose\u201d without losing identity and values along the way.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That tension may define Israel\u2019s next phase. Its leaders insist the country has changed the military equation against Iran, Hezbollah, and Hamas. Its lawyers, advocates, and supporters argue that the institutional equation\u00a0remains\u00a0far more difficult. In the UN, the ICC, the ICJ, and the court of public opinion, Israel is trying not only to defeat specific accusations but to prevent those accusations from becoming the language by which governments, courts, and media judge it.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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