After the Second World War, humanity created the United Nations as a guarantee that the horrors of global war, genocide, and lawlessness would never be repeated. The UN was meant to be an institution in which international law stood above political expediency, and where the protection of peace and human dignity was the shared responsibility of nations.
Eight decades have passed.
Today, a question is being asked with growing frequency that until recently would have seemed almost sacrilegious: has the United Nations exhausted its historical credit of trust?
This question does not arise because the UN criticizes Israel. Any democratic state must be open to criticism, and the actions of any government or army must be judged by the standards of international law.
The problem lies elsewhere — in the fact that the Organization itself increasingly abandons the principle of equal treatment toward states and conflicts.
The statistics of recent years speak for themselves. In 2024 alone, the UN General Assembly adopted 17 resolutions concerning Israel, compared with just seven for all other countries in the world combined. Over the past decade, the number of resolutions against Israel has exceeded the number of comparable resolutions adopted against every other country in the world combined.
One can debate each individual resolution. But it is impossible to explain such a glaring disproportion by concern for human rights alone.
The modern world contains regimes where millions of people are deprived of basic freedoms, where mass repression, ethnic cleansing, religious persecution, and political killings take place. Yet the attention of international bodies to these tragedies is nowhere near comparable to the attention devoted to the world's only Jewish state.
This no longer looks like the impartial defense of international law. It looks like institutional politicization.
This crisis became especially apparent after the tragedy of October 7, 2023.
Israel suffered the largest terrorist attack in its history. Civilians were murdered, entire families wiped out, women subjected to sexual violence, and hundreds of people taken hostage.
In the months that followed, tens of thousands of rockets, ballistic missiles, and drones were launched at Israeli territory from Gaza, Lebanon, Iran, Yemen, Syria, and Iraq.
Any other country in the world would have regarded such aggression as unquestionable grounds for exercising its right to self-defense.
Yet it is Israel that has found itself forced to justify, almost daily, its very right to defend its own citizens.
A natural question arises: what signal does such a practice send to the international community? Does it not suggest that terrorist organizations can attack democratic states with impunity, while the bulk of international pressure is directed at the victim of aggression?
But the crisis of trust is not confined to Israel.
The UN increasingly demonstrates its inability to prevent wars, secure the release of hostages, effectively counter international terrorism, or ensure the implementation of its own resolutions.
The Security Council remains paralyzed by the veto.
The Human Rights Council has repeatedly included states that themselves systematically violate the rights of their own citizens.
Numerous specialized bodies have turned into a cumbersome bureaucratic machine that exists largely to perpetuate itself.
States spend billions of dollars every year maintaining this system. But is the world community entitled to ask whether its effectiveness justifies that expense?
Today, virtually every state maintains a network of embassies, consulates, and special envoys, and participates in regional alliances and international coalitions. For humanitarian tasks, there is the International Committee of the Red Cross, specialized agencies, and countless charitable and non-governmental organizations.
This raises a natural question: could states not use a significant share of the funds spent maintaining the UN apparatus far more effectively, transparently, and directly?
This is not a call to abandon international cooperation. Quite the opposite. The world needs international law, diplomacy, humanitarian mechanisms, and platforms for negotiation.
But it is far from obvious that these require precisely the organizational structure created in 1945 — one that is increasingly failing to meet the challenges of the 21st century.
History has seen many international institutions successfully complete their historical mission and then give way to new mechanisms of cooperation.
Perhaps the United Nations has reached precisely such a turning point.
Yet a natural question follows: if the UN has truly lost trust and effectiveness, why don't states simply dissolve it?
The answer, unfortunately, is obvious: because they don't want to.
For too many, the existing state of affairs remains convenient.
Some use the UN as an instrument of political pressure.
Others treat it as an arena for ideological campaigns.
Still others treat it as a familiar diplomatic ritual, sustained purely by inertia.
And unfortunately, there are no shortage of states for which the constant condemnation of Israel has become almost their primary form of international activity.
It would therefore be naïve to expect the Organization to reform itself.
But if an institution cannot be changed, that does not mean it should continue to be legitimized by one's participation in it.
This is precisely why, in my view, Israel should seriously consider the question of withdrawing from the United Nations.
Such a step would not mean abandoning international law, diplomacy, or cooperation with the world community.
Israel would continue to honor its international obligations, develop bilateral relations, and participate in regional initiatives and humanitarian programs.
Moreover, the 21st century already offers new models of international cooperation, based not on bureaucracy and political blocs, but on shared interests, mutual respect, and joint development.
The Abraham Accords demonstrated that states are capable of building lasting partnerships without the mediation of unwieldy international structures. Economic cooperation, investment, scientific research, energy, advanced technology, and security create a far more solid foundation for peace here than endless political declarations.
No less promising is the initiative known as the "Isaac Accords," which brings together countries that share the values of democracy, mutual respect, and the fight against terrorism. Thirteen Latin American states have already expressed their readiness to join this initiative, evidence of a real demand for new formats of international engagement.
Perhaps it is precisely such flexible alliances of states, united by shared values and shared interests rather than outdated bureaucratic procedures, that will become the prototype of the international architecture of the 21st century.
Today, a substantial share of UN activity is focused on Israel. Endless resolutions, commissions, special committees, and emergency sessions create the impression that the very existence of the Jewish state is one of the world's foremost problems.
If Israel were to leave the UN, a significant part of this political construction would inevitably lose its meaning. The Organization would lose the object around which much of its political activity has been built for decades.
At that point, internal contradictions that are currently masked by an almost automatic anti-Israel consensus would inevitably surface. States united chiefly by voting against Israel would have to search for a new agenda and new grounds for unity.
It is far from certain that they would find one.
History knows cases when a single state's refusal to take part in a discredited institution became the beginning of profound international change. Perhaps the world is living through just such a moment today.
Israel should not leave the UN out of protest or resentment.
It should do so because international law deserves greater respect than an institution that increasingly substitutes politics for law.
Trust is the principal capital of any international organization.
Once that capital is exhausted, it cannot be restored through further resolutions, loud declarations, or cosmetic reforms.
It can only be rebuilt gradually, through the formation of new international alliances and institutions grounded not in automatic majorities and political expediency, but in shared values, mutual responsibility, and respect for international law. The Abraham Accords have already shown that this is possible. The Isaac Accords may become the next step in that direction.
Perhaps it is Israel that is best positioned to take that first step toward building such a system.
Dr. Michael Mirilashvili is the President of the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress