US vetoes UN resolution backed by many nations demanding immediate humanitarian cease-fire in Gaza | CityNews Calgary
The United States vetoed a United Nations decision Friday backed by the overwhelming majority of Security Council members and plenty of different nations demanding an instantaneous humanitarian cease-fire in Gaza.
The vote within the 15-member council was 13-1 with the United Kingdom abstaining.
U.S. deputy ambassador Robert Wood criticized the council after the vote for its failure to sentence Hamas’ assaults in Israel and to acknowledge Israel’s proper to defend itself. He declared that halting army motion would permit Hamas to proceed to rule and “only plant the seeds for the next war.”
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows beneath.
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United Nations chief and plenty of Security Council members demanded an instantaneous humanitarian cease-fire in Gaza on Friday, however the United States reiterated its opposition regardless of a direct attraction from Arab diplomats, just about dooming any motion by the U.N.’s strongest physique.
The international ministers of Saudi Arabia and different main Arab nations and Turkey have been in Washington on Friday on a uncommon joint mission to press the Biden administration to drop its opposition to a cease-fire. They have been scheduled to satisfy with Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday afternoon.
“If people are not seeing it here, we are seeing it,” Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi mentioned, including: “We’re seeing the challenges that we are are facing talking to our people. They are all saying we’re doing nothing. Because despite all our efforts, Israel is continuing these massacres.”
Israel’s greater than two-month army marketing campaign has killed greater than 17,400 folks in Gaza — 70% of them ladies and youngsters — and wounded greater than 46,000, based on the Palestinian territory’s Health Ministry, which says many others are trapped underneath rubble. The ministry doesn’t differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths.
The Security Council was scheduled to vote Friday afternoon on a decision by the United Arab Emirates, the Arab consultant on the 15-member physique, demanding an instantaneous humanitarian cease-fire. U.S. Deputy Ambassador Robert Wood’s assertion to the council Friday, nonetheless, signaled the United States will veto the decision.
Wood criticized the council for not condemning Hamas’ shock assault on Israel on Oct. 7 during which the militants killed about 1,200 folks, principally civilians, and took greater than 240 hostages.
He mentioned a cease-fire would depart Hamas in command of Gaza, nonetheless holding greater than 100 Israeli hostages.
No authorities would permit such a risk after the worst assault on its peoples in a long time, Wood mentioned, stressing {that a} halt to army motion would solely “plant the seeds for the next war, because Hamas has no desire to see a durable peace, to see a two-state solution.”
“For that reason, while the United States strongly supports a durable peace, in which both Israelis and Palestinians can live in peace and security, we do not support calls for an immediate cease-fire,” Wood mentioned.
The council referred to as the emergency assembly to listen to from Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who for the primary time invoked Article 99 of the U.N. Charter, which allows a U.N. chief to boost threats he sees to worldwide peace and safety. He warned of an “humanitarian catastrophe” in Gaza and urged the council to demand a humanitarian cease-fire.
Guterres mentioned he raised Article 99 — which hadn’t been used on the U.N. since 1971 — as a result of “there is a high risk of the total collapse of the humanitarian support system in Gaza.” The U.N. anticipates this could end in “a complete breakdown of public order and increased pressure for mass displacement into Egypt,” he warned.
Gaza is at “a breaking point,” he mentioned, and determined persons are at critical threat of hunger.
Guterres mentioned Hamas’ brutality towards Israelis on Oct. 7 “can never justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”
“While indiscriminate rocket fire by Hamas into Israel, and the use of civilians as human shields, are in contravention of the laws of war, such conduct does not absolve Israel of its own violations,” he burdened.
The U.N. chief detailed the “humanitarian nightmare” Gaza is dealing with, citing intense, widespread and ongoing Israeli assaults from air, land and sea that reportedly have hit 339 schooling amenities, 26 hospitals, 56 well being care amenities, 88 mosques and three church buildings.
Over 60% of Gaza’s housing has reportedly been destroyed or broken, some 85% of the inhabitants has been pressured from their properties, the well being system is collapsing, and “nowhere in Gaza is safe,” Guterres mentioned.
Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian U.N. ambassador, advised the council that Israel’s goal is “the ethnic cleansing of the Gaza Strip” and “the dispossession and forcible displacement of the Palestinian people.”
“If you are against the destruction and displacement of the Palestinian people, you have to be in favor of an immediate cease-fire,” Mansour mentioned. “When you refuse to call for a cease-fire, you are refusing to call for the only thing that can put an end to war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.”
Israel’s U.N. Ambassador Gilad Erdan burdened that regional stability and the safety of Israelis and Gazans “can only be achieved once Hamas is eliminated — not one minute before.”
“So the true path to ensure peace is only through supporting Israel’s mission — absolutely not to call for a cease-fire,” he advised the council. “Israel committed itself to the elimination of Hamas’ capabilities for the sole reason of ensuring that such horrors could never be repeated again. And if Hamas is not destroyed, such horrors will be repeated.”
Edith M. Lederer And Ellen Knickmeyer, The Associated Press
