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un security council
This Illegal US-Israeli Attack on Iran Is Also an Assault on the United Nations
Let us be clear about what the United States and Israel are pursuing. The US objective is not the security of the American people. The objective is global hegemony. The attempt is to destroy the UN and the international rule of law—an attempt that will fail.
Mar 02, 2026
On February 16, 2026, one of us (Jeffrey Sachs) sent a letter to the UN Security Council warning that the United States was on the verge of tearing up the United Nations Charter. That warning has now come to pass. The United States and Israel have launched an unprovoked war against Iran in flagrant violation of Article 2(4) of the Charter, without authorization from the Security Council, and without any legitimate claim of self-defense under Article 51. They are trying to kill the UN Charter and the international rule of law, but they will fail.
At the Security Council on February 28, 2026, the US and its allies directed their condemnation not at the American and Israeli aggression, but at Iran. One US ally after the next condemned Iran for its retaliatory attacks yet absurdly failed to condemn the illegal and unprovoked US-Israeli attack on Iran. This performance by these countries was disgraceful and turned reality completely upside down.
The joint US-Israeli attacks were described by Trump as necessary because Iran “rejected every opportunity to renounce their nuclear ambitions, and we can't take it anymore.” This is of course a flat lie. As the letter of February 16 recounted, Iran agreed a decade ago to a nuclear deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) that was adopted by the UN Security Council in Resolution 2231. It was Trump who ripped up the agreement in 2018. In June 2025, Israel bombed Iran in the midst of US-Iran negotiations. This time too, the Israel-US war plans were set weeks ago when Netanyahu met with Trump, and the negotiations underway between the US and Iran were a charade. This seems to be the new modus operandi of the US: start negotiations and then aim to murder the counterparts.
It is easy to understand why the US allies behave in the embarrassing and self-abasing way they did at the UN Security Council. In addition to the United States, eight of the other fourteen Council members host US military bases or grant the US military access to local bases: Bahrain, Colombia, Denmark, France, Greece, Latvia, Panama, and the United Kingdom. These countries are not fully sovereign. They are partially governed by the US. The US military bases house CIA operations, and the host countries constantly look over their shoulder to try to avoid US subversion in their own countries.
As Henry Kissinger famously said, “It may be dangerous to be America’s enemy, but to be its friend is fatal.” We can add that to host US military bases and CIA operations is to turn your country into a vassal state.
As an absurd but telling example, the Danish ambassador parroted every US talking point, pointing her finger at Iran for its aggression as if Iran had not been attacked by the US and Israel. She completely forgot that such humiliating vassalage to the US will not play well for Denmark if the US occupies Greenland.
The truthful voices at the Security Council came from the countries not occupied by the United States. Russia explained correctly that the so-called West (that is, the countries occupied by the US) is engaged in victim-blaming when it points its finger at Iran. China reminded the Council that the crisis began with the US and Israeli attacks on Iran, not with Iran’s retaliation. Somalia’s ambassador, speaking on behalf of several African member states, truthfully portrayed the source of this recent escalation. The UN Representative of the League of Arab States spoke brilliantly about the root cause of Israel’s mad aggression: the denial of rights to Palestinian people, and Israel’s use of mass murder and regional war to prevent the emergence of a State of Palestine.
When Iran retaliates against US military bases in the Gulf, it is exercising its inherent right of self-defense under Article 51 of the Charter. We must remember that the US and Israel are openly and repeatedly assassinating Iran’s leaders, with the aim of overthrowing its government. When states murder a foreign head of state and attempt to destroy the government, the target of those threats is entitled under international law to defend itself.
The US-Israeli bombing murdered not only Iran’s Supreme Leader and several top government officials, but also more than 140 young girls in their school in Minab. These young children are the victims of a horrific war crime. The countries today that gave a pass to the United States and Israel for these killings—notably Denmark, France, Latvia, the United Kingdom, and of course the US —are also complicit in this war crime.
This UN Security Council emergency meeting will likely be remembered as the day the United Nations ceased to function from its headquarters on American soil. An international organization dedicated to the peaceful settlement of disputes cannot credibly operate from a country that wages illegal wars, threatens member states with annihilation, and treats UN Security Council resolutions as disposable instruments of convenience. For the UN to survive, and we need it to survive, it will need several homes around the world—in Brazil, China, India, South Africa, and others—honoring the true multipolarity of our world.
Let us be clear about what the United States and Israel are pursuing. The US objective is not the security of the American people. The objective is global hegemony. The attempt is to destroy the UN and the international rule of law—an attempt that will fail. Israel’s objective is to establish a Greater Israel, destroy the Palestinian people, and assert its hegemony over hundreds of millions of Arabs across the Middle East (from the Nile to the Euphrates, as US Ambassador Mike Huckabee recently asserted).
The United States’ delusional efforts at global hegemony are proceeding region by region. The US has recently claimed, in a wholly twisted supposed revival of the Monroe Doctrine, that it controls the Western Hemisphere and can dictate how Latin American countries conduct their economic and political affairs. The US kidnapped the sitting Venezuelan president to prove the point, and it now threatens to overthrow the Cuban government as well.
Today’s war against Iran aims to prove that the US similarly owns the Middle East. The war is part of a 30-year campaign, initiated by the Clean Break doctrine, to overthrow all governments that oppose US and Israeli hegemony in the region. Those joint Israel-US wars have included the genocide in Gaza, the occupation of the West Bank and the decades of wars and regime-change operations in Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen.
One part of the US global plan is to commandeer the world’s oil exports and to weaken China and Russia in the process. The US seizure of Venezuela was designed to ensure American control of that country’s oil exports, especially to control the flow of oil to China. US sanctions on Russia aim to prevent Russian oil from reaching India and China. Now the US aims to stop the flow of Iran’s oil to China. More broadly, the US aims to control the entire Gulf region plus Iran to maintain its imperial dominance.
The international order that Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt helped to build after the catastrophe of WWII was founded on a simple and profound idea – that law and respect, not force, should govern relations among states. That idea is now being destroyed by the very nation that did most to promote it in founding the UN. The irony is bitter beyond measure.
The truth is that the devastation of the war will not directly affect the so-called West: their children will not suffer traumas or death, and their countries will not be set ablaze. The victims of this attack are the people of the Middle East. They are the expendable ones who suffer from Western arrogance, abuse of power, and addiction to war.
We close with two observations. First, the United States will not achieve global hegemony or kill the UN. The world is too large, too diverse, and too determined to resist domination by any single power, much less one with 4 percent of the world’s population. The world outside of the US and the countries it occupies want the UN to live and thrive. The US attempt will surely fail, but it may cause immense suffering before it does.
Second, if Israel continues its addiction to war and occupation, it too will not survive. That addiction represents a mix of theocracy and post-traumatic stress. Part of Israel believes that it is the biblical kingdom of the 5th century BC. The other part lives in the traumatic memory of the Holocaust, and so is determined to kill any perceived adversary rather than learn to live together with it in peace. The Israeli Ambassador’s twisted defense of Israel’s brazen attack on Iran, as usual, cited the Bible and Auschwitz as the two justifications. These are Israel’s two perennial references, but not the real world of today.
A state that depends on permanent war, permanent occupation and slaughter of the Palestinians, and the indefinite subjugation of millions of people has no viable future, and the policies that the United States is now pursuing on Israel’s behalf will accelerate rather than prevent that outcome.
The two-state solution, which the Council has endorsed repeatedly, offers Israel a path to peace. Tragically Israel rejects that. The result, eventually, will be the end of Israel itself in its current form, especially as the US population is rapidly turning against Israel’s violent theocracy and towards the cause of Palestine. Perhaps there will be one democratic state for both Arabs and Jews living in peace, together, with an end of apartheid rule.
These are harsh truths, but emergencies demand honesty. The UN is being murdered by Israel and the United States. The Security Council must rouse itself from their military occupation by the US, and remember that they are the stewards of the UN Charter’s promise to maintain international peace and security.
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No US War on Iran: An Open Letter to the UN Security Council
The current threat of an attack by the US did not begin with any failure by Iran to negotiate. On the contrary, it began with the United States’ repudiation of negotiations that had already succeeded.
Feb 16, 2026
Distinguished Members of the Security Council,
The President of the United States is issuing grave threats of force against the Islamic Republic of Iran if it does not accede to US demands. His actions risk a major regional war that would be devastating. Asked if he wanted regime change, he responded that it "seems like that would be the best thing that could happen." When asked why a second US aircraft carrier has been sent to the region, President Trump answered "in case we don't make a deal, we'll need it ... if we need it, we'll have it ready."
These threats are in violation of Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, which declares that “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.”
These threats come in the context of Iran’s repeated calls for negotiations. Moreover, on February 7, Iran’s Foreign Minister delivered a speech in Doha proposing comprehensive negotiations for regional peace, following a round of talks in Oman supported by the diplomacy of the Arab states and Türkiye. Even as a second round of negotiations has been announced, the US is resorting to escalating threats of force.
Today, the world is in urgent need of a renewed commitment to diplomacy.
The issue facing the UN Security Council in these perilous days is whether any member state, by force or threat of force, may place itself above the United Nations Charter that governs us all. At stake is the integrity of the UN-based international system.
One of the crucial roles of the Security Council is to call on member states to settle disputes by peaceful means such as negotiation, mediation, arbitration, or judicial settlement, without the threat of force or resort to force. Today, the world is in urgent need of a renewed commitment to diplomacy.
The current threat of an attack by the US did not begin with any failure by Iran to negotiate. On the contrary, it began with the United States’ repudiation of negotiations that had already succeeded.
On July 14, 2015, after years of extensive diplomacy, Iran and the P5 countries plus Germany concluded the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) to ensure that Iran’s nuclear program would remain exclusively peaceful. In return, economic sanctions on Iran were to be lifted. The JCPOA placed Iran’s nuclear activities under strict and continuous scrutiny by the International Atomic Energy Agency and thereby ended the risk of a nuclear-arms breakout by Iran, a risk that Iran had consistently denied.
On July 20, 2015, the UNSC unanimously adopted Resolution 2231. That resolution “endorses the JCPOA” and calls upon all states to take the steps “necessary to support the implementation.” It terminated previous sanctions resolutions and incorporated the JCPOA into international law. The Security Council explicitly recognized Iran’s “right to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes” under the Non-Proliferation Treaty and established a robust verification regime.
Yet on May 8, 2018, three years after the successful UNSC Resolution, the United States unilaterally withdrew from the JCPOA. This withdrawal was actively lobbied for by the Israeli government. Since the late 1990s, Israel’s leadership has repeatedly, falsely, and hypocritically claimed that Iran was on the verge of obtaining a nuclear weapon, even as Israel itself had secretly acquired nuclear weapons outside the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and has until today refused to join the treaty and subject itself to its controls.
When President Trump unilaterally withdrew the United States from the JCPOA, the US reimposed wide-ranging sanctions in direct contradiction of Resolution 2231 and launched a campaign of economic warfare designed to cripple Iran’s economy that continues to this day.
The current threats by the US are therefore part of a long-standing pattern of feigning interest in negotiations while in fact pursuing economic warfare and military force. In June 2025, following the renewal of negotiations earlier that year, the United States and Iran entered a sixth round of talks. The US had characterized the negotiations as constructive and positive. The sixth round was set for June 15, 2025. Yet on June 13, 2025, the US supported Israel’s bombing of Iran. A week after that, the US attacked Iran under Operation Midnight Hammer.
The US assault on the UN Charter has now escalated once again to the brink of war, with US threats of force and acts of economic warfare proceeding daily. The US has been escalating its military presence near Iran and has repeatedly threatened to launch an imminent attack.
The administration has also been candid about its strategy of economic warfare. On January 20, in an interview in Davos, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent described how the US had deliberately engineered the collapse of the Iranian currency, a dollar shortage, and a collapse of imports, all with the goal of fomenting economic suffering and mass unrest. Bessent described the resulting unrest as “moving in a very positive way here.”
The current threats by the US are therefore part of a long-standing pattern of feigning interest in negotiations while in fact pursuing economic warfare and military force.
The most striking aspect of the US campaign for regime change in Iran is the repeated US insistence that Iran must negotiate. Iran has negotiated, repeatedly. The JCPOA was negotiated and ratified by the UN Security Council. Even after Iran engaged in renewed negotiations last summer, it faced large‑scale air strikes on its territory. Now, the US openly avows the policy of economic collapse and regime change.
No country is safe if the United States can make brazen threats against Iran and indeed several other states in recent weeks, including Cuba, Denmark, and others.
It is both sad and poignant to recall that the United Nations was the brainchild of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. He envisioned an era of great-power cooperation and multilateralism under international law as the basis of international peace and security. His wife, Eleanor Roosevelt, oversaw the drafting and adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The US at that time envisioned an era in which diplomacy would prosper, and a time in which law and justice rather than brute force would prevail, a time when we would honor the words of the Prophet Isaiah inscribed on the wall on First Avenue facing the United Nations: “They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation. Neither shall they learn war any more.”
To allow the UN Charter to be ruthlessly violated, no less by its host country, is to invite the return to global war, this time in the nuclear age. In other words, it is to invite humanity’s self-destruction. On behalf of We the Peoples, the UN Security Council carries the authority and heavy responsibility to keep the peace.
Sincerely yours,
Jeffrey D. Sachs
University Professor at Columbia University
Appendix. I humbly offer below an illustrative Draft Resolution by which the UNSC could fulfill its duty in the current context.
The Security Council,
Recalling the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations, in particular the obligation of all Member States to refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State, as set forth in Article 2(4) of the Charter,
Reaffirming that the maintenance of international peace and security rests upon respect for international law, the authority of the Security Council, and the peaceful settlement of disputes,
Recalling its resolution 2231 (2015), adopted unanimously on 20 July 2015, by which the Security Council endorsed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and called upon all Member States to take actions necessary to support its implementation,
Reaffirming its commitment to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, the need for all States Party to that Treaty to comply fully with their obligations, and recalling the right of States Party, in conformity with Articles I and II of that Treaty, to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes without discrimination
Acting under the Charter of the United Nations,
- Calls upon all Member States to immediately and unconditionally cease all threats or uses of force and to comply fully with their obligations under Article 2(4) of the Charter of the United Nations;
- Acknowledges that the JCPOA constituted a valid multilateral negotiation endorsed by the Security Council, and recognizes that the abandonment of the JCPOA resulted from the unilateral withdrawal of the United States;
- Decides that, under its authority, the UNSC mandates all States concerned to immediately engage in negotiations to conclude a renewed comprehensive arrangement on the Iranian nuclear issue, building upon the principles of the JCPOA and fully consistent with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons;
- Calls upon all Member States to refrain from actions that undermine diplomatic efforts, escalate tensions, or weaken the authority of the United Nations;
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Venezuela Calls on UN Security Council to Back Immediate Release of Maduro, Condemn Unlawful US Attack
"Today, it is not only Venezuela's sovereignty that is at stake, but the credibility of international law."
Jan 05, 2026
Governments throughout Latin America and beyond on Monday blasted the US military's invasion of Venezuela and its abduction of President Nicolás Maduro during an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council.
Samuel Moncada, the permanent representative of Venezuela to the United Nations, demanded that the Security Council call for Maduro's immediate release and condemn the US invasion of his country.
Moncada also warned that President Donald Trump's actions would lead to a dangerous unraveling of international law and return to a system in which militarily strong countries feel free to invade weaker ones with impunity.
"Allowing such acts to go without an effective answer would amount to normalizing the replacement of law by might, while eroding the very foundations of the collective security system," he said. "Today, it is not only Venezuela's sovereignty that is at stake, but the credibility of international law, the authority of this organization, and the validity of the principle that no state can set itself up as a judge, party, and executor of the world order."
Venezuela Ambassador to the @UN Samuel Moncada: "No state can set itself up as a judge, party and executor of the world order...Venezuela is the victim of these attack because of its natural resources." pic.twitter.com/j17sHZk5kA
— CSPAN (@cspan) January 5, 2026
Representatives from several other nations joined Moncada's condemnation of the US invasion.
Sérgio França Danese, permanent representative of Brazil to the United Nations, said that the US military's actions "cross an unacceptable line," and set "an extremely dangerous precedent for the entire international community."
"The acceptance of actions of this nature would inexorably lead to a scenario marked by violence, disorder, and the erosion of multilateralism, to the detriment of international law and institutions," said Danese. "As Brazil has reiterated on numerous occasions, the norms that govern coexistence among states mandatory and universal."
At the UN security council the representative of Brazil condemns the actions of the United States as a flagrant violation of international law and goes on to mention the genocide in Gaza as an example of how international governance mechanisms are being weakened. pic.twitter.com/36tEUoJtAv
— Saul Staniforth (@SaulStaniforth) January 5, 2026
Héctor Enrique Vasconcelos y Cruz, permanent representative of Mexico to the United Nations, said that the US military's actions in Venezuela "must not be allowed," as they "constitute a severe blow to the charter and to multilateralism."
Ernesto Soberón Guzmán, permanent representative of Cuba to the United Nations, accused the US of targeting Venezuela purely for reasons of imperial aggression.
"The US military attack against Venezuela has no justification whatsoever," Guzmán said. "It does not respond to any provocation, nor does it possess legitimacy. It is based on the... doctrine of peace through force, and undermines the stability and peace that had characterized our Latin American and Caribbean region for years."
Guzmán added that the "ultimate objective" of the US operation is "not the false narrative of combating drug trafficking, but control over Venezuela’s natural resources, as has been shamelessly declared by President Trump."
Cuban Representative: Its ultimate objective is not the false narrative of combating drug trafficking, but control over Venezuela’s natural resources as has been shamelessly declared by President Trump and his Secretary of State. pic.twitter.com/FDCJoFcduX
— Acyn (@Acyn) January 5, 2026
Jonathan Passmoor, acting deputy permanent representative of South Africa to the UN, accused the US of dangerously degrading the UN charter with its unprovoked attack on Venezuela.
"We all benefit from a rules-based international order based on international law," said Passmoor. "When we break these norms, we invite anarchy and an environment where might make right, ignoring the complexity of interrelations and interdependence in our modern world."
The South African ambassador also warned of the US setting dangerous precedents that could herald more global conflict.
"The belief that might is right, is reinforced and diplomacy is undermined," he said. "History has repeatedly demonstrated that military invasions against sovereign States yield only instability and deepen crisis."
[ Watch] Statement by the Republic of SouthAfrica to the United Nations Security Council Meeting on the situation in Venezuela delivered by Mr Jonathan Passmoor Acting Deputy Permanent Representative https://t.co/DPPXBKIAxO pic.twitter.com/KuQZdJqBVa
— Chrispin Phiri 🇿🇦 (@Chrispin_JPhiri) January 5, 2026
Trump over the weekend said that the US would be "running" Venezuela for the foreseeable future, although it is not clear how he plans to administer control over the nation given that the rest of Maduro's government, led by Acting President Delcy Rodriguez, remains in control of the state.
Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday that Rodriguez would follow US orders or a fate "worse than" Maduro's awaits here.
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