Top UN legal investigators conclude Israel is guilty of genocide in Gaza

Hopefully we are at the beginning of a change, but I doubt this will come only from the UN.

The UN is the only international democratic institution that - even with its many imperfections - prevents the world to fall into complete anarchy. It's quite telling that it gets ignored since so many years by the country that elevates itself as the world defender of democracy, the US.

The UN has voted for decades for ending the embargo towards Cuba. Every year the outcome of the vote, which has always resulted in a great majority demanding the immediate end of the embargo, has been ignored by the US, resulting in millions of Cubans facing extreme economic consequences since many decades. The last time every country except Israel and US voted for ending the embargo (I might be wrong, maybe a single African state abstained).

In all of this, the only seed of joy I see, was seeing the Cubans a couple of years ago, after decades and decades of seeing their economy strangled by the most powerful country on Earth, roll out their own Covid vaccine just at the same time of those of big Pharma - a vaccine that resulted excellent, effective, and cheap. Hats off for the Cubans. Hope to see some other seed like this also in the Palestinians.

What people fail to understand about dynamics between countries, is ultimately there is no supreme court or arbiter of truth. The UN doesn't have authority over any powerful country (or non powerful country for that matter).

People seem to have this concept that there is some supra national legal system, or even moral system that can hold a higher truth than what powerful countries want, but there isn't. When it comes to geopolitics, the biggest and most powerful sets the rules and lives by them (or not). The USA has zero motivation to do something the UN wants it to do, if it doesn't itself want to do it. No one is going to hold it to account.

Ultimately - whoever controls the violence can set the rules. For the last 80 years that's been the US. Maybe that is changing, but not quite yet.

The UN isn't an international democratic institution. For the last 20-30 years it's been a powerless theatre. And it didn't have much power before then either. Because ultimately, whoever has the most nukes and the biggest army rules the world.

One hopeful observation is that I actually have seen coverage of the genocide in a local newspaper this time. N=1 of course (and I'm not sure what other local newspapers have been like), but that's more than before.

> The UN is the only international democratic institution that - even with its many imperfections - prevents the world to fall into complete anarchy. It's quite telling that it gets ignored since so many years by the country that elevates itself as the world defender of democracy, the US.

It's not been ignored the purpose of the UN is for largely irrelevant countries to petition the world powers to maybe consider doing something. The UN has been so successful because it has no real power over players like the USA.

> The UN has voted for decades for ending the embargo towards Cuba.

Ok? I mean the purpose of the UN is for people to suggest stuff to players like the USA not for the USA to actually do what the UN votes for.

It's weird to claim that one country should be forced to trade with another country. International trade is voluntary on both sides. The US isn't responsible for keeping any other country's economy healthy. It's simply not our problem, and Cuban economic problems are a consequence of their own corruption and dogmatic incompetence. Should the US also be forced to trade with, let's say, North Korea?

The UN serves as a valuable diplomatic forum but let's not pretend that is does have or should have any real power or authority.

Its important to note that most of those "irrelevant" countries are only irrelevant because they're perpetually under the thumb of world powers. Hence why they petition the UN. And, hence why empires and somewhat-formally colonial nations ignore them.

Ultimately, a lot of the wealth of the West comes from core countries siphoning wealth from the periphery and propping up psueodo governments to place their thumbs on the scale of world politics. Exhibit A: Israel.

Empires are not exclusive to the West, and those also ignore the UN. For many of the countries under their thumbs, the West has at least sometimes been acting in their defense.

The US sanctions countries and/or foreign businesses that trade with Cuba, the embargo isn't simply between the US and Cuba. Because the US has effective control of most of the world's financial system, it is able to enforce this.

> People seem to have this concept that there is some supra national legal system, or even moral system that can hold a higher truth than what powerful countries want,

Can you blame them? The same countries facilitating this genocide have been telling everyone they uphold principles of human rights and democracy, and a "rules based international order*, and that they oppose genocide. Only now are enough horrors breaking through in such a surreal way that people are forced to notice the contradictions.

Yes, of course. No one is required to use the US financial system. Other countries are welcome to build their own. Why should we allow ours to be used to prop up a brutal and illegitimate communist dictatorship?