This is CBSI on the world. I'm John Batsler, welcoming my good colleague Professor Richard Epstein.

He writes for the Civitas Institute. He teaches law at NYU and the University of Chicago.

Right now he's writing of the UN Charter, Article 51, I quote,

Nothing in the present charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective

self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a member of the United Nations until the

Security Council has taken measures necessary to

maintain international peace and security.

Professor, a very good evening to you.

The UN Charter is surprisingly unambiguous.

You're attacked.

You get the right to defend yourself.

The question at hand right now is Israel

defending itself from the onslaught of Iranian surrogates. Hamas, Hisbalah, the Houthis,

and the IRGC itself, and its kindred of Kane in and around Syria, sometimes al-Qaeda, sometimes worse.

However, the question has been raised these last days, has Israel violated in some sense its mandate to defend itself?

This has to do chiefly with the Gaza scenario.

There are hostages being kept by Hamas, some dead, some

alive, and there is no end to the negotiation. Israel at the same time has made decisions to put the

IDF back inside Gaza and deal with a neighborhood that is said to be the center of the Hamas resistance and

violence. There are other attended issues such as feeding the Gaza population and Hamas making war

on its own population in order to exacerbate the debate over Israel's conduct. However, most recently we have the headlines. We're told

that President Macron of France will recognize in some fashion the state of Palestine, complicating

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