Rarely if ever has it become so clear that the authors of the United Nations treaty delivered America a bad bargain. That is what we take from the world body’s claim to be immune from a lawsuit brought by victims of October 7 against its Relief and Works Agency. And from the Biden administration’s claim that it must respect such immunity. If President Trump earns a second term, it’d be time to begin the process of getting us out of the UN.

The lawsuit, filed at the Southern District of New York, aims to hold Unrwa accountable for its role in the atrocities visited on Israel by Hamas, our A.R. Hoffman reports.  The UN — begrudgingly — acknowledges that its own personnel “may” have joined in the carnage. Israel alleges widespread complicity. The Jewish state’s discoveries in Gaza suggest that, to a shocking degree, Hamas and Unrwa worked together hand in glove.

The suit, brought on behalf of 101 victims of Hamas, alleges that Unrwa was complicit in an atrocity and that the plaintiffs were “mercilessly hunted, tortured, kidnapped, sexually assaulted and killed by an organized attack launched by Hamas with genocidal intent.” The victims argue that Unrwa “knowingly provided Hamas with the safe haven of its Gaza facilities to plan, stage and coordinate the October 7 Attack,” among other collaborations. 

Yet Mr. Biden’s Department of Justice maintains that the “United Nations is absolutely immune from suit and legal process” because of America’s “treaty obligations to respect the immunities of the United Nations and its officials.” Unconvincing would be our word for the DOJ’s claim that Unrwa’s crimes are unanswerable in America’s courts, even though treaties, like acts of Congress and the Constitution itself, are part of the “supreme Law of the Land.” 

Even parts of our Bill of Rights, after all, are open to question when they conflict with other parts of the Constitution. Same with the immunities established in the UN Treaty. This is what litigation is for. The absurdity of Attorney General Garland coming to the defense of Unrwa’s chief, Philippe Lazzarini — and the agency employees moonlighting as terrorists and genocidaires — points to the larger folly of our entanglements with the United Nations. 

The United States attorney for the Southern District, Damien Williams, enumerates the shackles that bind: the UN Charter, the Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the UN, the Vienna Convention, and the Geneva Conventions. Even the Second Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals gave its imprimatur to the UN’s “absolute immunity from suit unless it has expressly waived its immunity.” It reckons that America tied its own hands. 

The October 7 plaintiffs are well aware of this body of law, and they insist that their suit can move forward despite the treaties. They maintain that there can be no free pass “to aid and abet genocide, mass murder, mass rape, and commit other violations of fundamental human rights with impunity.” They cite “the most serious and fundamental rules of international law,” and aim to persuade Judge Analisa Torres that their cause is viable.

We wish the victims well, but we can’t help but lament the state of affairs that could preclude their path toward justice. What is the logic of America being bound to the UN, which thwarts our aims at every turn and is unendingly hostile toward our Israeli ally? And which empowers our foreign foes. The immunity of even such a malignant force as Unrwa in our courts underscores the need for Congress to declare independence — from the UN.     

The Sun, let us just add, was among those who opposed joining Wilson’s League of Nations, a UN precursor, if it meant, as one editorial put it in 1919, “yielding by a millimeter’s breadth of any portion of American sovereignty and independence in the conduct of our foreign relations.” That, the Sun warned, would mean “the sacrifice of that which is more precious to our republic and its people even than peace itself.”