Could the Israel–Hamas war be the death knell for the United Nations? For decades, waste, fraud, and abuse have characterized the organization. The perks of patronage — first-class travel, high salaries, fancy titles, and pretensions to make policy absent democratic accountability — attract elites. Progressives, academics, idealists, and those seeking to check American power block reform and seldom acknowledge that the U.N. does not live up to its founding principles. Minor budgetary cuts get reversed, and U.N. officials filibuster reform until they outlast whoever is in the Oval Office.

A second Trump administration may change that. Former President Donald Trump cares little about elite opinion. Policy shifts once deemed beyond the realm of the possible could suddenly rebound. John Birch Society conservatism never posed the threat to U.S. support for the U.N. that Trump might. For the first time in decades, “UNexit” is a possibility.