UN elects Iran to key committee overseeing organization's global priorities despite criticism

 

Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Kim Son Gyong speaks during the 81st session of the United Nations (U.N.) General Assembly at U.N. Headquarters on September 28, 2026 in New York City.

(photo credit: Ryan Murphy/Getty Images)

ByDANIELLE GREYMAN-KENNARD

NOVEMBER 11, 2026 20:13

Updated: NOVEMBER 11, 2026 20:16

The United Nations General Assembly elected the Islamic Republic of Iran to the UN Committee for Programme and Coordination on Wednesday, giving Tehran a seat on a key body responsible for reviewing and coordinating the organization’s programs and priorities, despite its record of human rights abuses and support for terrorist organizations. Iran received 144 votes in favor in a secret-ballot election, according to the voting results.

During Wednesday’s session, Israel raised objections to what it described as a double standard in the treatment of Israeli candidates, accusing Arab groups of repeatedly subjecting them to politically motivated votes and calling the process a “waste of time and resources.” Critics, including UN Watch Executive Director Hillel Neuer, had repeatedly urged international representatives to demand a vote on Iran’s candidacy to block its election, following the Islamic Republic’s nomination by the UN’s 54-member Economic and Social Council in April.

A delegate from Iran listens to President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressing the 81st session of the United Nations (U.N.) General Assembly at U.N. Headquarters on September 23, 2026 in New York City. (credit: Alexi J. Rosenfeld/Getty Images)

UN Watch condemns Iran's election to key committee as 'travesty of justice'

“They are planning to elect the Islamic regime in Iran to a UN committee that shapes priorities on women’s rights and terrorism prevention,” Neuer said. “This is a travesty of justice. … They massacred tens of thousands of people in January, [so] the notion that they would be named to this committee is an absurdity.”

 “The UN General Assembly just elected the murderous Islamic Republic of Iran to its Committee for Program and Coordination, the main body shaping the world organization’s priorities on Women’s Rights, Human Rights, Disarmament, and Counter-Terrorism,” he wrote on X/Twitter after the vote was announced.

www.jpost.com/international/article-914618

Trump does the Democrats’ work for them

 

Israel is not simply a consumer of American security. It is a major contributor.

(Nov. 11, 2026 / JNS)

Last January, I warned that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was scoring an own goal by proposing to phase out American military assistance over the next decade. He had volunteered to surrender one of Israel’s most important strategic assets without receiving anything in return. U.S. President Donald Trump has seized on that unforced error and announced that he intends to terminate all military aid by the end of the year.

Some analysts are celebrating the decision as a long-overdue step toward freeing Israel from American dependence and interference. They were wrong when Netanyahu floated the idea, and they are wrong now.

Ironically, after months of hand-wringing by Israel’s supporters over Democrats’ flirtation with cutting aid, it was the president who boasts of being the most pro-Israel in history who stabbed Israel in the back, or in the front, if you believe Trump’s claim that Netanyahu had been urging him to do it. Congressional Democrats who had repeatedly failed to win support for cutting or conditioning aid could scarcely believe their good fortune. Trump had handed them a victory they could never achieve on their own.

The announcement’s timing, on Election Day, fueled suspicion that Trump naively thought he could help Republicans in tight races by depriving Democrats of an issue they had been exploiting. The suspicion was reinforced when he said, “Why should we suffer the slings from lunatics like El-Sayed when they don’t need it? It’s a bad talking point,” referring to Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, Michigan’s Democratic Senate nominee. “The left uses the $4 billion payment … as a signal of unfairness. It’s almost too easy a target.”

Trump was willing to sacrifice a bedrock of the U.S.-Israel alliance to neutralize a Democratic campaign slogan. The decision did nothing to save El-Sayed’s Republican opponent or stem the Democratic tsunami that swept Republicans aside across the country.

Equally troubling is Trump’s apparent failure to understand how military assistance works. Like Israel’s critics, he speaks as though the United States hands Israel a $4 billion check when most of the money is spent in America, purchasing weapons from American manufacturers, supporting American workers and sustaining communities supported by defense production. The program is as much an investment in the American defense industrial base as it is assistance to Israel.

Nor does Trump appear to appreciate what America receives in return. Israel confronts enemies that also threaten the United States, supplies invaluable intelligence, develops advanced military technologies and provides battlefield experience that no American laboratory can replicate. Israel is not simply a consumer of American security. It is a major contributor.

Israel already has considerable autonomy, as demonstrated by its destruction of the Iraqi and Syrian nuclear reactors.

When I criticized Netanyahu’s proposal, I argued that Israel should take advantage of a friendly administration to negotiate a new 10-year memorandum of understanding guaranteeing continued military assistance. Such an agreement would not prevent a future Democratic administration or Congress from reducing aid, but it would raise the political cost of doing so.

That opportunity was squandered.

Worse, the administration is not simply planning to eliminate assistance. It is reportedly demanding concessions that could make Israel more dependent on Washington, not less. According to Israeli reporting, American negotiators want greater control over Israeli defense technology, including patents, intellectual property and jointly developed weapons systems.

Think about the implications. Israel would surrender billions in military assistance while conceivably giving Washington greater control over the very innovations that make its defense industry competitive. American officials could acquire additional leverage over the development, production and export of Israeli weapons. Instead of purchasing greater independence, Israel could find itself paying more for its defense while controlling less of its own technology.

That is hardly the emancipation advocates of ending aid have promised.

Trump justifies his decision by arguing that Israel is wealthy enough to pay for its own weapons. But wealth does not make defense spending painless. Every additional dollar Israel must spend on American aircraft, helicopters and munitions is a dollar unavailable for education, health care, infrastructure and social welfare.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Israel would have to pay approximately $10 billion for outstanding weapons orders, roughly one-fifth of its current defense budget. The Journal also noted that Israel already devotes approximately 7% of its gross domestic product to defense, a larger share than any NATO member.

Israel’s air force depends on American aircraft and helicopters. Without military assistance, maintaining and modernizing that force will become substantially more expensive. Even more alarming is the prospect of losing American funding for missile defense. Systems such as Iron Dome, David’s Sling and Arrow have saved countless Israeli lives while improving technologies of enormous value to the United States. Jeopardizing that cooperation would damage both countries.

Worse, the decision will be read around the world as more proof that America cannot be trusted.

Over the past year, America’s Arab partners have watched the security umbrella they relied on fold when Trump refused to come to their defense. Now they, and everyone else, have watched him abruptly rewrite the terms of America’s relationship with Israel. The lesson is unmistakable: If Washington’s closest ally in the region can’t count on long-standing commitments outlasting the president’s latest political calculation, no one can. Friends will hedge their bets, and adversaries in Tehran, Moscow and Beijing will take note.

Anyone who believes that Trump’s decision would preempt Democratic attempts to weaken the U.S.-Israel relationship is sadly mistaken. If anything, he emboldened them, as reflected in the comments of Darializa Avila Chevalier, the newly elected progressive congresswoman from New York, who said: “Ending military aid is not enough. We need to end U.S. taxpayer funding for Israel’s war crimes, a full arms embargo and the Palestinian right of return.”

As Nellie Bolles of The Free Press noted, “The goalposts keep moving because the movement’s actual goal isn’t keeping tax dollars at home—it’s the destruction of Israel and subjugation of the Jews, but they can’t quite say that. Not yet, anyhow.”

Some supporters of Israel nevertheless insist that eliminating assistance will produce a healthier, more balanced relationship. Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the United States, sees the folly in that argument: “There is no strategic logic in this position. The United States has one ally that is willing to fight shoulder to shoulder with it. There is one country that significantly enhances America’s security capabilities through its technology, and it is located in the most sensitive place in the world. Who would want to reduce that country’s ability to help the Americans and contribute to U.S. security?”

Trump justifies his decision by arguing that Israel is wealthy enough to pay for its own weapons. But wealth does not make defense spending painless.

Jacob Siegel and Liel Leibovitz argued in Tablet magazine that ending aid to Israel would “restore Israeli autonomy and reduce U.S. leverage over the Jewish state.” This is nonsense.

Israel already has considerable autonomy, as demonstrated by its destruction of the Iraqi and Syrian nuclear reactors. Since Oct. 7, Israel has repeatedly acted according to its own assessment of its security requirements, sometimes in defiance of Washington’s wishes.

The U.S. constraints are not because of military aid, but because America is a superpower.

Washington has an arsenal of coercive tools that have nothing to do with military grants. It can impose tariffs and sanctions, limit intelligence cooperation, restrict weapons sales and spare parts, target tax-exempt organizations that support Israel, support international legal proceedings against Israeli officials or abandon Israel at the U.N. Security Council.

Siegel and Leibovitz acknowledged that “ending aid won’t end the practice of scapegoating Jews,” but contend that “it will remove a favorite decoy and dog whistle of American public officials, philanthropists and thought leaders.” As Avila Chevalier made clear, however, removing aid will further whet their appetite of Israel’s detractors for more aggressive measures.

Netanyahu opened the door by offering to give up assistance that Israel had every reason to preserve. Trump has now kicked it down.

The result is a stunning reversal. Democrats who wanted to weaken the U.S.-Israel relationship have watched a Republican president take the first big step for them while, astonishingly, some supporters of Israel applaud the loss of a cornerstone of Israel’s defense as a triumph of independence.

Israel will survive without American aid. It will spend more, make painful budget choices and race to expand its own defense industry. But surviving a self-inflicted wound doesn’t make inflicting it a prudent decision.

The challenge now for Israeli diplomats and the pro-Israel lobby is damage control. They must fight to preserve funding for missile defense; ensure that Israel retains its Qualitative Military Edge as the law requires; protect Israeli intellectual property; guarantee access to indispensable American weapons; and prevent a financial restructuring from becoming a strategic retreat.

More fundamentally, Israel and its supporters must redouble their efforts to remind Americans that Israel is not a charity case but America’s most reliable ally in the Middle East—a nation that shares its values, advances its crucial strategic interests and bolsters its national security.

Iran renewing efforts to obtain nuclear weapons, says Israeli defense minister

 

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz attends a memorial ceremony for fallen Israeli soldiers of the 1973 Yom Kippur War, at the National Hall of Remembrance at Mount Herzl in Jerusalem, Sept. 22, 2026. Photo by Chaim Goldberg/Flash90.

(Nov. 8, 2026 / JNS)

The Iranian regime is renewing its efforts to obtain nuclear weapons, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz warned on Sunday.

“Regarding Iran, the mission is still not complete,” Katz said, speaking at a memorial ceremony for soldiers who fell in “Operation Kadesh” against Egyptian forces in the Sinai in 1956.

The defense minister said Tehran’s renewed nuclear push comes “alongside other serious efforts that put the State of Israel in real danger.”

“We cannot accept these threats,” he declared, adding that Israel must be prepared for any scenario and act to protect its citizens.

Katz said the Jewish state is “determined today, more than ever, to stand firm over its destiny, to act preemptively and to pursue a proactive and offensive policy against our enemies.”

He also called for unity ahead of “the great tasks still before us.” When the security of the nation is at stake, he stressed, “we must know how to rise above our disagreements.”

“This is a time of unity, of responsibility and of mutual solidarity,” Katz concluded.

www.jns.org/news/israel-news/iran-renewing-efforts-to-obtain-nuclear-weapons-says-israeli-defense-minister

Atlanticism versus Eurasianism (philosophy of Aleksandr Dugin, by Alexander Maistrovoy)

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/435963

Shortly before the elections, during a meeting with Russian-speaking bloggers, Netanyahu stated that Russia was conducting a massive campaign to undermine Israel. He specifically mentioned the Russian philosopher Aleksandr Dugin, calling him a “terrible person" who exerts a destructive influence on young American right-wingers, turning them against Israel.

So, who is Dugin, what is his influence on Kremlin policy, and why is he a “terrible person"?

Atlanticism versus Eurasianism

Dugin divides the world into two gigantic camps:

• Thalassocracy (Atlanticism): The Western world, led by the US and the UK, whose values include the market economy, individualism, secularism, liberal democracy, and cosmopolitanism.
• Tellurocracy (Eurasianism): Continental civilizations, with Russia at their core. Their values include hierarchy, collectivism, service to the state, strong supreme authority, and adherence to religious tradition. The proponents of Eurasianism encompass all the cultures and civilizations of Eurasia: Russia, China, and the Islamic world-including regional powers like Turkey and Iran.

A life-or-death struggle is underway between these two worlds. There is - and can be - no room for compromise; the war must end with the total defeat of one side.

By virtue of its position, Russia serves as the core of the Eurasian camp, uniting all other players around itself.

From a marginal movement to a mainstream ideology

Before the invasion of Ukraine, Dugin’s eccentric views occupied a marginal place in Russian politics. However, the protracted, grueling, and bloody meat grinder in Ukraine has radically changed the situation.

The Russian regime found itself cut off from and hostile toward the West. Economically weak and deprived of Western technology, it could henceforth rely only on Asian regimes. Politics and economics dictated the need for a new ideology, and Dugin’s construct fit perfectly into this new geopolitical reality: totalitarian regimes, autocracies, and theocracies of the East - rooted in the traditions of the past - set against a cosmopolitan, “decaying," and “satanic" West.

Israel as a bulwark of Atlanticism in the heart of Eurasia

What is Israel’s role in this “war of worlds"? It is strictly and unequivocally negative. From this perspective, Israel is a proxy outpost of “Atlantic civilization" - an existential enemy of “age-old traditional civilizations." Therefore, Israel must not merely be weakened, but completely destroyed.

This concept has been adopted by the Kremlin and is being fully implemented. While Moscow previously sought to act as an objective mediator in the Middle East and even showed a certain sympathy toward the Jewish state, it has now fully and unequivocally aligned itself with Iran, Hezbollah, and Hamas.

The era of benevolent neutrality is a thing of the past; it has been replaced by open and arrogant hostility.

Dugin has begun attributing all sorts of conspiracies and schemes to Israel, much like the Nazis and Stalin did regarding the Jews. According to his account, the terrorist attack at Crocus City Hall was orchestrated by the Mossad, and Israel has become a haven for those who loathe Russia and its imperial greatness.

Dugin’s obsession with Israel has spread to the Kremlin. His concept - that “the war in the Middle East is part of our broader struggle against American hegemony"-has become a cornerstone for the Russian Foreign Ministry and the country’s leading propaganda outlets.

Since October 7, the sympathies of the Russian elite have shifted entirely toward Iran and its allies.

Destroying Israel using American hands

How can one undermine and destroy this "bastion of Atlanticism" to achieve a decisive turning point in the “clash of worlds"? To do so, one must strike at Israel’s most vulnerable point - namely, its alliance with the United States, and more precisely, its alliance with the Republican Party, given that the Democratic Party has already largely turned its back on Israel.

Dugin and Kremlin propagandists are instilling the idea among impressionable young Americans that U.S. support for Israel is an unnecessary burden. Moreover, they argue that since Israel serves as a bastion of the ‘liberal globalism’ and ‘woke culture’ that is hostile to ‘traditional America,’ so it is in the interest of ‘patriotic Americans’ to bring about the destruction of this bastion - the sooner, the better.

Among Dugin’s followers are Tucker Carlson, Glenn Greenwald, and Alex Jones. Steve Bannon even met with him for a conversation that reportedly lasted eight hours. Other figures who openly promote Dugin’s ideas include Jack Posobiec, one of the most influential activists among the American youth right, with millions of followers on X; Lauren Southern, a well-known right-wing activist and blogger; and Jack Hanick, a former producer for Fox News.

Nick Fuentes and his ‘Groypers’ have also emulated Dugin’s ideology, combining overt authoritarianism and militant antisemitism with a hatred for Israel and fervent sympathy for Eurasian regimes and the Islamic world, including Iran and its ‘Axis of Resistance.’

The Russian machine for smearing Israel is running at full throttle on social media, targeting young American Republicans. They are led to believe that Tel Aviv is one of the hubs of global LGBT culture and liberalism in the Middle East. Accordingly, they are told that by defending Israel, they are defending the very same "progressive left agenda" that they oppose back home.

To what extent does this activity influence the worldview of right-wing youth in America?

The impact appears to be significant. One poll showed that 46 percent of voters aged 18-24 and 60 percent of those aged 25-29 would support a proposal “to completely dismantle Israel and replace it with a Palestinian-led nation in exchange for ending the war with Iran and providing the United States with lower oil and gas prices."

Moreover, 4 In 10 Young Americans Support Sharia Law. Another survey, conducted by the Republican-aligned polling firm Cygnal among 1,500 likely midterm voters, found that just 41 percent of respondents aged 18-29 support Israel’s right to exist.

The Republican Party and Israel have a massive task ahead of them to neutralize Dugin’s toxic propaganda.

The younger generation of American right-wingers must realize that the destruction of Israel is merely the first step toward the destruction of both American democracy and the United States as a nation. The ultimate goal of ‘Eurasian’ tyrannies is not cooperation with the United States, but its total destruction as a civilization that is both hostile and dangerous to them. As Dugin himself has noted, there can be no room for compromise.

If the American youth who today listen to Tucker Carlson, Steve Bannon, Nicholas Fuentes, and now Vance, fail to grasp this simple truth, they will eventually have to bid farewell to their country.

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/435963

Trump cites ‘dislike for Israel,’ Iran war among reasons for GOP midterm losses

 

US President Donald Trump speaks to the media before boarding Air Force One at President Donald J. Trump International Airport in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Nov. 8, 2026. Photo by Alex Wroblewski / AFP via Getty Images.

The U.S. president defended the strikes on Iran as essential to Israel’s survival, while saying renewed fighting was “highly unlikely” if negotiations progressed.

(Nov. 9, 2026 / JNS)

U.S. President Donald Trump attributed Republican losses in last week’s midterm elections partly to the war with Iran, higher gasoline prices and what he described as a “great dislike” for Israel.

In an interview with CBS News’ “60 Minutes” that aired on Sunday, Trump said, “They didn’t like the war.”

“And there’s a great dislike—incredibly—for Israel. There seems to be a dislike for Israel,” he added.

Asked whether he agreed with Vice President JD Vance’s post-election analysis blaming the Iran war for the Republican defeat, Trump said, “I don’t disagree with it.” He said Vance had consulted him before publishing a social media post and that he had told the vice president to “write what you feel.”

In the post on Wednesday, Vance described a conversation with a pollster who asked disaffected Republicans why they were voting for Democrats.

“The top four answers, accounting for nearly all of the responses, were: end the war, focus on cost of living/inflation, put America first and change our relationship to Israel,” Vance wrote. “Our voters showed up, and the above four reasons are why many of them voted for Democrats.”

William Galston, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, disputed that explanation in comments to JNS, saying exit polls showed that only 7% of Trump-Vance voters had voted for Democrats.

“The real explanation for what happened is that Trump-Vance voters stayed home in droves,” said Galston.

Despite the electoral losses, Trump defended his decision to strike Iran, crediting the June 2025 U.S. attacks on three Iranian nuclear facilities with preventing Israel’s destruction.

“Israel would not exist except for Donald Trump,” he told CBS, claiming that Iran had been two weeks away from obtaining a nuclear weapon before the strikes.

Asked whether he regretted helping Israel carry out strikes against Iranian leaders, Trump said, “I want to have it for the long term, not for the short term.”

“If I didn’t do that, there would be no Israel right now,” he added.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi seized on Trump’s remarks about Israel, writing on X early Monday that Americans were “sick and tired of Israel bamboozling US administrations into Forever Wars.”

Trump also told CBS that he was not seeking further escalation following the midterms and believed a deal with Tehran remained possible.

In a separate telephone interview with CNN on Sunday, he said renewed fighting with Iran was “highly unlikely,” provided negotiations progressed toward dismantling Tehran’s nuclear program and reopening the Strait of Hormuz.

“I would if necessary, but we hit them really hard,” he said. “They’re withering away financially. We’ve hit them militarily. We could finish them off.”

Separately, Trump told reporters before boarding Air Force One in West Palm Beach, Fla., on Sunday that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yashar Party leader Gadi Eisenkot held “very similar” views.

“It’s certainly a contest between him and Bibi Netanyahu,” Trump said. “We’ll see what happens.”

Israeli President Isaac Herzog earlier on Sunday tasked Eisenkot with forming the next government. Eisenkot has 28 days to assemble a coalition, with a possible extension of up to 14 days.

Trump also named Secretary of State Marco Rubio as a potential 2028 Republican presidential candidate alongside Vance. Asked whether he would endorse a candidate, he told CBS, “Probably. Not necessarily.”

Joshua Marks

Joshua Marks is a news editor on the Jerusalem desk at JNS.org, where he covers Jewish affairs, the Middle East and global news.

www.jns.org/news/u-s-news/trump-cites-dislike-for-israel-iran-war-among-reasons-for-gop-midterm-losses