Our New, Favorite Phrase: Unbalanced and Unworkable, and Hence Unwise.

The Bush Administration has given voice to several serious problems of American national security interest that the previous administration left unmentioned. Sham negotiations with North Korea over its missile program. Russian arms proliferation and sales of nuclear technology to Iran. Renewed and expanded fighting in the Balkans. Chinese missile proliferation in range not only of Taiwan, but Japan and South Korea and human rights abuses. Iraq. Palestinian responsibility for the violence that has killed and maimed its own children along with Israelis.

The Bush Administration has given voice to several serious problems of American national security interest that the previous administration left unmentioned. Sham negotiations with North Korea over its missile program. Russian arms proliferation and sales of nuclear technology to Iran. Renewed and expanded fighting in the Balkans. Chinese missile proliferation in range not only of Taiwan, but Japan and South Korea and human rights abuses. Iraq. Palestinian responsibility for the violence that has killed and maimed its own children along with Israelis. All previously ignored, but now on the table for serious consideration.

Just this month, the U.S. has twice taken on the “blame-Israel” crowd at the UN, and maybe put down markers for the thus-far-totally-biased-Mitchell commission that has yet to make its report on the Palestinian war against Israel.

UN Human Rights Commissioner Mary Robinson went to Israel in October, and pronounced herself “shocked, dismayed and even devastated” by the violence, which she attributed primarily to Israeli violations of Palestinian rights. Not a word about the orchestration of violence by the Palestinians, and only a brief nod to Israeli victims, who, while fewer in number, are killed in much more deliberate ways (i.e., murdered in sniper, car bomb and suicide attacks against people not engaged in hostile activity).

When Mrs. Robinson made her report this week to the UN Rights Commission in Geneva, she was rebuked by the head of the U.S. delegation, who said, “The causes of this situation are many and complex, and no one should be under any illusion that they stem from just one side. We believe the high commissioner could have made this point much more clearly in her report.”

Then, using our Security Council Veto for the first time in four years, the U.S. nixed a Palestinian-demanded resolution calling for a UN observer force to be inserted into the territories over Israeli objections. An NSC spokesman said the resolution failed to address the fact that civilians on both sides – Palestinians and Israelis are being killed, and was not clear about the responsibility of Palestinian leaders to take concrete steps to end the violence. The US rejected even a watered down version of the draft, insisting no UN-sponsored strategy was feasible without an agreement between the parties.

“The United States casts this vote with great regret,” said acting U.S. Ambassador James Cunningham. “It should not have been necessary, and this draft should not have been put to a vote. (We) opposed this resolution because it is unbalanced and unworkable, and hence unwise. It is more responsive to political favor than political reality.”

It is remarkable, excellent and not the least bit regrettable that the United States stood up to the UN on behalf of Israel, of bilateral negotiations as the appropriate mechanism for making decisions that affect both parties, and of assigning the responsibility for violence to those who foment it.