Deputy US ambassador says immediate ceasefire in Gaza ‘would only plant seeds of next war’
The United States has vetoed a United Nations Security Council request for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in the war between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas in Gaza.
Thirteen Security Council members voted in favor of a brief draft resolution, presented on Friday by the United Arab Emirates, while the United Kingdom abstained.
The vote came after U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres took a rare step Wednesday to formally warn the 15-member council of the global threat posed by the two-month-old war.
“While the United States strongly supports a lasting peace in which Israel and Palestine can live in peace and security, we do not support calls for an immediate ceasefire. This would only plant the seeds of the next war, because Hamas has no desire to see a lasting peace, a two-state solution,” said Robert Wood, deputy US ambassador to the UN.
The United States and Israel oppose a ceasefire because they believe it would only benefit Hamas. Washington instead supports pauses in fighting to protect civilians and allow the release of hostages taken by Hamas during the deadly October 7 attack on Israel.
A seven-day break – during which Hamas released some hostages and increased humanitarian aid to Gaza – ended on December 1.
After several failed attempts at action, the Security Council last month called for a pause in fighting to allow aid access to Gaza, which Guterres described Friday as a “spiraling humanitarian nightmare.”
The United States is prioritizing its own diplomacy, rather than Security Council action, to secure the release of more hostages and pressure Israel to better protect civilians in its assault on Gaza , which he launched after the Hamas attack that Israel says killed 1,200 people. Gaza’s health ministry says more than 17,480 people were killed in the Israeli attack.
The vote came after Guterres used the rarely used Article 99 of the United Nations Charter to draw the Council’s attention to “any matter which, in his opinion, could threaten the maintenance of peace and security.” international security”.
Tel Aviv Tribune diplomatic editor James Bays said Guterres’ invocation of Article 99 of the UN Charter was extremely rare.
“He (Guterres) has never done it before. In fact, it hasn’t been officially invoked since 1989,” Bays said, adding that it has not been invoked in Syria, Yemen or Ukraine.
Dozens killed in Israeli attacks
Israel bombarded Gaza from the air, imposed a siege and launched a ground offensive. Vast areas of the territory have been reduced to wasteland. The UN says about 80 percent of the population has been displaced, facing shortages of food, fuel, water and medicine, as well as the threat of disease.
“There is no effective protection of civilians,” Guterres told the Council on Friday. “The population of Gaza is being asked to move like human pinball machines – ricocheting between smaller and smaller fragments of the south, without any of the basics of survival. But nowhere in Gaza is safe. »
In Washington, Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi told reporters Friday that if the Security Council does not adopt the resolution, “it gives Israel authorization to continue its massacre of Palestinians in Gaza.”
In Gaza, the Health Ministry reported Friday that 40 people were killed in Israeli attacks near Gaza City, and that “dozens” more were killed in Jabalia and Khan Younis.
The Israeli army asked residents of Gaza City’s Jabalia, Shujayea and Zeitoun districts to move west.
In the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where Israeli forces shot dead six Palestinians on Friday, the territory’s Health Ministry announced.
