At the White House on Tuesday evening, First Lady Jill Biden will be hosting a ceremony to honor the United States' re-entry into the antisemitic and anti-Israel United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), which it quit in 2019.

She is doing so at the same time as Vice President Joe Biden is heading to Israel to express sympathy with Israel as it fights a war of self-defense against the Palestinian terror group Hamas, as Breitbart News reported.

Hamas launched a huge onslaught on Israel on October 7, and it has been responsible for the deaths of over 1,400 Israelis up to this point.

Previous Reports on UNESCO

A law that would have required the United States to pay back dues and rejoin UNESCO was finally approved by Congress a year ago.

As Breitbart News pointed out around the end of last year, Section 7070 on page 1582 of the bill would allow the president to waive Section 414 of Public Law 101–246 of 1990,

That law would bar the United States from funding any United Nations organization that gives the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) the same standing as member states.

According to section 410 of Public Law 103-236, the United States government cannot provide financial support to the United Nations or any other organization linked with the UN that provides state membership to an entity that is not a state.

These rules became effective in 2011, when the Obama administration found itself in the unenviable position of having to reduce financing to UNESCO as a result of the organization's decision to admit Palestine as a member state.

The United States and Israel both pulled out of the organization in 2019, following years of anti-Israel resolutions and overt antisemitism, including the denial of any Jewish connection to the city of Jerusalem.

The Departure

At the time of their departure, the United States was still withholding payments totaling approximately $550 million from the organization.

The omnibus bill, on the other hand, includes a provision that allows the United States to rejoin UNESCO and pay back hundreds of millions of dollars in funds that were withheld.

This could be done if the president determines that “to do so would enable the United States to counter Chinese influence or to promote other national interests of the United States,” This provision is both meaningless and open-ended.

If any other United Nations institution recognizes "Palestine" without first reaching a formal peace agreement with Israel, then this clause is null and void.

Israel did not raise any objections to the United States rejoining UNESCO; but, Israel has not done so itself, despite the fact that it is a member of UNESCO's World Heritage Committee.