At the UN Security Council on Tuesday this week, Palestinian Permanent Observer Riyad Mansour called for “a strong international response before it is too late” with regard to settler violence in the occupied West Bank. However, it is already too late. It has been too late for decades now, and the rhetoric used by diplomats doesn’t help Palestinians achieve a semblance of dignity, let alone autonomy and liberation.

Israeli state and settler violence increases in relation to the government’s requirements for colonial expansion. Rhetoric, however, has stayed several steps behind. It is not until it is too late that statements are issued about how the international community needs to step in to protect Palestinians. However, in 1947, the international community decided on collusion with Zionist colonialism. Decades ago, the UN had already determined it would not protect Palestinians from the violence it helped to create.

Instead, the UN opted for meaningless symbolic commemorations that even distorted........

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