Oxymoron: "UN-designated safe area"

The United Nations has again proven itself unworthy of civilized nations' respect or trust. This "world body" habitually places criminals on an equal, or higher, moral plane than their victims. The UN's criticism of Israel is the most recent example, but its arms embargo on Bosnian Muslims was another.
The UN's recent condemnation of Israel ignores the Geneva and Hague Conventions. Under international law, the Hezbollah and Hamas terrorists are guilty of at least three major war crimes:
 

1. They deliberately attack Israeli civilians.
2. They hide among Lebanese civilians while shooting at Israeli civilians.
• The Geneva Convention  says, "The presence of a protected person [civilian] may not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations." It is a war crime for combatants to hide among or behind civilians.
3. They conceal their weapons and disguise themselves as noncombatants.
• The Hague Convention  says, "The laws, rights, and duties of war apply not only to armies, but also to militia and volunteer corps fulfilling the following conditions… To have a fixed distinctive emblem recognizable at a distance; [and] To carry arms openly."

The Geneva and Hague Conventions give us a remedy for foreign military or paramilitary organizations whose members commit terrorism. They're foreign combatants, they're committing acts of war (or war crimes), and they're not wearing uniforms. We don't need antiterrorism legislation to handle them. Apply the letter of international law, and let our Armed Forces court-martial them. Israel, whose civilian laws do not include capital punishment, also should apply military justice to terrorists.

Now consider the tired statement, "One person's terrorist is another's freedom fighter." A terrorist is a coward who shoots or bombs civilians. A freedom fighter attacks the enemy's soldiers and tanks. Calling Hezbollah and Hamas "freedom fighters" insults veterans of the French Resistance (Maquis), Hungary's revolution (1956), and the Afghan rebels who fought the Soviets.

The UN General Assembly is like a jury that includes violent felons. Saudi Arabia treats half its population (women) as serfs, while Sudan allows slavery. During the 1970s, Iran executed Bahai women for being "enemies of God." These nations' ambassadors represent, at most, a few strongmen with enough thugs and guns to call themselves governments.

The United Nations imposed an "evenhanded" arms embargo on the Serbian ethnic cleansers and their Bosnian victims. Under similar standards, England and France would have embargoed Poland, Nazi Germany, and Stalinist Russia in 1939. Instead of giving Lend-Lease to England, we would have embargoed both England and Germany. If the Iranians violated the UN embargo by arming the Bosnian Muslims, they behaved correctly.
Until the United Nations changes its behavior, its resolutions are unworthy of notice, let alone respect or compliance.

Reference: Hughes, Daniel J. 1993. Moltke on the Art of War– Selected Writings. Presidio Press, Novato, CA.  (Helmuth Karl Bernhard, Graf von Moltke, 1800-1891)