...At a dinner last night (no link; we were there), Bolton told the Zionist Organization of America to expect more such unilateral veracity. He singled out for criticism a recent U.N. conference at which Israel was literally wiped off the map (well, wiped off a literal map anyway). U.N. watchdog Anne Bayefsky has a photo of the map of "Palestine" that was used in last month's annual U.N. Day of Solidarity With the Palestinian People.

Bayefsky has a photo of Kofi Annan on the dais with the map in the background. The Simon Wiesenthal Center issued a press release Friday in which it "condemns the participation" of the secretary-general in a conference that denies the existence of a U.N. member state.

We would like to know where the 43 senators--42 Democrats plus the lachrymose George Voinovich--who blocked a vote on Bolton's confirmation, forcing President Bush into a recess appointment--stand on all this. One could wave away such outrages, and indeed we're inclined to do so, on the ground that the U.N. is a hopelessly corrupt and worthless institution whose expressions count for nothing. But that is an awkward position for Bolton's detractors to take, since they claim to believe in the U.N.

They don't really believe in the U.N., of course. As we noted in April, in 1991 many of them voted to defy the U.N.'s request for troops to liberate Kuwait from Saddam Hussein's Iraq. They are "pro-U.N.," it seems clear, only when the U.N. is anti-U.S. But again, if the U.N. has "moral authority" when it takes Saddam Hussein's side over ours, how about when it seeks the obliteration of Israel?

There is a right way and a wrong way, strangely, to call for the elimination of Israel.

The secretary-general of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, provided an example of both ways in recent weeks. When the president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, stated on October 26 that "the regime occupying Jerusalem must be eliminated from the pages of history," Mr. Annan replied by expressing "dismay." Again on December 8, when Ahmadinejad called for Israel to be moved to Europe, Annan responded with "shock."

But dismay and shock at Ahmadinejad's statements did not prevent Annan from participating on November 29, just between the Iranian's outbursts, in a U.N.-sponsored "International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People."...