The joke that has become the UN

For years now, the United Nations has become a biased institution which has shown little to no leadership in the world. But especially in the Middle East, the fallacies of the UN are magnified. I cannot help but laugh as daily, CNN reports of the UN inspectors bouncing from site to site in Iraq coming back empty handed. Even the 12,000 page report submitted to the United Nations was most likely the biggest waste of paper I have seen in a while considering that the report answered none of the questions the world had of Saddam Hussein. And now the UN boasts about how they are interviewing Iraqi scientists to "get to the bottom of it all". In reality, it is clear that any Iraqi scientist, who would even fathom deviating from Saddam's contention that Iraq has no weapons of mass destruction, would be assassinated with no hesitation at all.

For years and years, the United Nations has allowed Saddam's dangerous weapons building to go unmonitored and now after about seven years, the inspectors are supposed to uncover it all. It just is not logical, yet the United Nations continues to believe that the inspectors are the answer to proving that Saddam is not responsible for any wrongdoing and does not support the use of force to disarm Saddam.

But it is not just in Iraq, where the UN fails to lead. It is also with the Israeli Palestinian conflict as well. The United Nations can send out meaningless condemnations of Israel time and time again, but the result changes nothing on the ground. People are being killed and busses are being blown up, yet somehow, each time a bus is blown up, the UN fails to pass a resolution totally condemning Yassir Arafat or his Palestinian Authority. It only asks for peace and for human rights to be respected. I ask, what about the people who are sitting on a bus from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, are their human rights not infringed upon if and when the bus blows up? When a desperate suicide bomber takes his own life and the lives of those around him, the UN doesn't "feel" that human rights were violated, however; if the Israeli army takes a pre-emptive measure and kills a terrorist before he is able to strike, Israel is condemned. Where is the balance? Where is the fairness?

How can the United Nations be trusted by Israel when it has in the past among other things declared that Zionism was a racist movement? It is absurd and unheard of. Even when Israel complies with a UN resolution like it's May 2000 pullback from Southern Lebanon, the UN fails to guarantee safety. After the Israeli army left the area, the UN forces responsible for safeguarding the Lebanese side of the border, allowed Hezbollah terrorists to abduct three Israeli soldiers during a routine border patrol. It was later revealed that these terrorists had the help of United Nation's workers and soldiers. Yet, no actions were taken to punish anyone in the incident and Israel still does not know the fate of these three young men. But still, the United Nations expects Israel to trust it and allow UN soldiers to guard their boarders with the Palestinian areas. Israel cannot and should not be expected to trust United Nations soldiers at this point.

If the United Nations and the Palestinians want peace, they have a funny way of going about it. The problem lies in the notion that for years now, many have contended that the powerful Israel was bullying the weak Palestinian people; however, in all honesty it has really been the small Israeli nation against the world. Israel has been scrutinized, criticized and unfairly boycotted by many factions of the world and a lot of this has to do with the one-sided and narrow minded views of the United Nations. There has to be change. When a terrorist haven such as Syria, sits on the all important Security Council, something is very wrong. The United Nations needs some balance and reform to once again gain the respect of the world and especially the respect of those nations which it is trying to change and protect.

Ilan Behm is a freshmanmajoring in Environmental Engineering.