The childish withdrawals made Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s point better than his rhetoric every could. Before the Israeli leader even began his Thursday speech before the U.N. General Assembly, dozens of delegates from other nations simply walked out rather than hear him speak. If diplomats know anything, it’s how to smile politely through speeches both boring and outrageous. So their decision to boycott the speech entirely is more than just petulance; it signals their position that Israel has no right to national existence.

Netanyahu chose to roll with the punches. “Before I begin, just a quick announcement: If there are any other moral cowards who haven’t yet left this hall — please do so now,” he taunted.

Even so, this is not how the United Nations was designed to function. “The United Nations is supposed to be bringing leaders around the world together to have a dialogue, and yet they get up and walk out,” exclaimed Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) on “Washington Watch.” “I applaud Prime Minister Netanyahu for taking such a strong stand in a very hostile environment.”

And what a strong stand it was! “It did not look like Benjamin Netanyahu held back at all in addressing the international body,” observed Family Research Council President Tony Perkins. Netanyahu reminded his hearers of “the darkest day in Israel’s history,” October 7, 2023. “On that horrific day, thousands of Palestinian terrorists stormed into Israel from Gaza. I want you to know there wasn’t a single Israeli in Gaza at the time. Not a civilian, not a soldier. Not one! It didn’t matter one bit.”

“The Hamas terrorists committed the worst slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust,” he described. “They went house to house, shooting Israeli civilians point-blank. They did so with fiendish glee. With sadistic joy, they live-streamed as they murdered.”

If such plain language was uncomfortable for the tony elites assembled for dialogue in New York City, imagine how uncomfortable it was for Israeli civilians crouching in crowded kibbutzim near the Gaza Strip, wondering if they would live or die.

By calling out Hamas’s evil before the U.N. General Assembly, Netanyahu “was calling them to account for being more critical of them than the terrorists that started this conflict,” Perkins noted.

Stutzman agreed, adding that the U.N. delegates who boycotted the speech “showed their hypocrisy” by doing so. He pointed out “the silence when it comes to Russia and Ukraine, where Russia invades Ukraine and Ukraine is being attacked daily and just bombarded by the Russians. You don’t hear the same outcry towards President Putin and the Russians [as you do towards Israel]. So the hypocrisy is really thick at the U.N. when it comes to Israel.”

“A significant development” in Netanyahu’s approach was “that he was very aggressive in defending Judea and Samaria, something that he’s not been very vocal about,” Perkins noted. Stutzman agreed but noted Israel’s increasing boldness since October 7 to buck international plaudits in pursuit of their own security. After “the attacks on Israel from Gaza,” he said, they consider that, “they did it once. They will do it again. They will continue to establish themselves in some parts around Israel to attack.” So, why leave them ground in the heart of Israel?

“It’s not about territories; it’s about a Jewish state at any boundaries,” Netanyahu declared. “Every day they try to murder our people. And in particular, they try to murder our people in our historic homeland, in Judea. By the way, that’s where the word Jew comes from. Judea — that’s our land. They try to murder us, thousands of attempts per year on families, peaceful families driving along the roads. They shoot at pregnant women; they shoot entire families.”

“Of course, none of this is covered in the international press or on social media,” he accused. “What they cover is a handful of juvenile delinquents, about 150 in number, who throw stones, who chop down olive trees. Occasionally, they light some fires. … That’s what they call ‘settler violence.’”

In fact, Netanyahu even went so far as to demand that other countries thank Israel for neutralizing the Iranian nuclear threat.

“Fourteen years ago, I stood on this podium, and I drew a red line. I vowed to prevent Iran’s murderous dictatorship from developing atomic bombs, nuclear weapons aimed at destroying Israel, nuclear weapons that could threaten the entire world. That’s exactly what we did,” he said. “In defending itself, Israel is also defending many of the countries whose delegates just left this hall! In fact, I want you to know that many of their leaders even thank us privately for taking out Iran’s nukes. It’s hard to imagine more mind-blowing hypocrisy, but that’s exactly what it is.”

“We see this over and over where those who were attacked are now somehow the problem,” Stutzman reflected. But “Prime Minister Netanyahu is doing the right thing by defending Israel.”

“We have no other choice,” Netanyahu declared repeatedly. “Throughout this long war, our goal never wavered: To win! To win with unwavering resolve. To win with unrelenting courage. Because this is Israel. One nation fighting for one future.”

That single-minded focus on victory is something Israel maintains with the desperation of survival. “For Israel, this is about their very existence,” Perkins declared. “That’s not hyperbole.” Meanwhile, the West treats winning like a luxury — and one not worth the steep price tag.

“If it wasn’t for President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu standing strong against these terrorist monsters, who knows what would be happening today? And that’s why Israel is going to defend its borders,” Stutzman said. “That’s partially why Prime Minister Netanyahu is saying, ‘We’re not going to let this happen again, whether it’s on the northern border of Syria and Lebanon or whether it’s in the West Bank.’ They’re going to be sure that Israel is protected, and they should. We cannot let another October 7th happen again.”

Even with such resolve, Israel continues to sustain terror attacks. “Three days ago, a French citizen, Netanel Shukrun, a father of six, was gunned down when he visited a spring with his 16-year-old son,” shared Netanyahu. “A Hamas terrorist in Judea and Samaria comes and fires point-blank at him. And the last words he uttered: ‘Flee, flee, son. Save yourself.’”

That is precisely what Israel is trying to do. Somehow, despite the deck stacked against them, “the country just continues to blossom and bloom,” Stutzman marveled. Like Nehemiah’s men, “they continue to rebuild the country with sword in one hand and building the city and the country with the other hand. And it’s incredible to see how Israel just continues to thrive in spite of the threats and the attacks that they face on a daily basis.”

“And we’re going to continue to stand with them,” Perkins responded. That’s something most of the United Nations refuses to do.