The United Nations Security Council today approved a toned-down bid to boost humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip and called for urgent steps ‘to create the conditions for a sustainable cessation of hostilities’ after a week of vote delays and intense negotiations to avoid a veto by the United States.
Amid global outrage over a rising Gaza death toll in 11 weeks of war between Israel and Hamas and a worsening humanitarian crisis in the Palestinian enclave, the U.S. abstained to allow the 15-member council to adopt a resolution drafted by the United Arab Emirates.
The remaining council members voted for the resolution except for Russia which also abstained.
Following high-level negotiations to win over Washington, the resolution no longer dilutes Israel’s control over all aid deliveries to 2.3 million people in Gaza. Israel monitors the limited aid deliveries to Gaza via the Rafah crossing from Egypt and the Israeli-controlled Kerem Shalom crossing.
But a weakening of language on a cessation of hostilities frustrated several council members – including veto power Russia – and Arab and Organisation of Islamic Cooperation states, some of which, diplomats said, view it as approval for Israel to further act against Hamas for a deadly October 7 attack.
Ambassadors vote during a meeting about the situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian question, at UN headquarters in New York on December 22, 2023
Palestinians, living in the Bureij Refugee Camp, leave their homes with their belongings to proceed towards the city of Deir al-Balah following Israeli Forces’ asking them to leave the camp in Bureij, Gaza, on December 22, 2023
Palestinians, living in the Bureij Refugee Camp, leave their homes with their belongings to proceed towards the city of Deir al-Balah following Israeli Forces’ asking them to leave the camp in Bureij, Gaza, on December 22, 2023
The adopted resolution ‘calls for urgent steps to immediately allow safe, unhindered, and expanded humanitarian access and to create the conditions for a sustainable cessation of hostilities.’ The initial draft had called for ‘an urgent and sustainable cessation of hostilities’ to allow aid access.
‘By signing off on this, the council would essentially be giving the Israeli armed forces complete freedom of movement for further clearing of the Gaza Strip,’ Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia told the council before the vote.
Russia proposed the draft be amended to revert to the initial text calling for ‘an urgent and sustainable cessation of hostilities.’ The amendment was vetoed by the United States. It received 10 votes in favor, while four members abstained.
Earlier this month the 193-member U.N. General Assembly demanded a humanitarian ceasefire, with 153 states voting in favor of the move that had been vetoed by the United States in the Security Council days earlier.
The U.S. and Israel oppose a ceasefire, believing it would only benefit Hamas. Washington instead supports pauses in fighting to protect civilians and free hostages taken by Hamas.
Permanent Representative of the United Arab Emirates to the United Nations Lana Nusseibeh, flanked by representatives of Arab countries, speaks to the press after a vote to approve a resolution that ‘demands’ all sides in the Israel-Hamas conflict allow the ‘safe and unhindered delivery of humanitarian assistance at scale’ at UN headquarters in New York on December 22, 2023
The United Arab Emirates Ambassador to the United Nations Lana Zaki Nusseibeh speaks on the day of a vote of the United Nations Security Council, at the U.N. headquarters in New York, U.S., December 22, 2023
Russian Permanent Representative to the U.N. Vassily Nebenzia speaks during the Security Council meeting at United Nations headquarters, Friday, Dec. 22, 2023
Last month the United States abstained to allow the Security Council to call for urgent and extended humanitarian pauses in fighting for a ‘sufficient number of days’ to allow aid access. The move came after four unsuccessful attempts to take action.
Washington traditionally shields its ally Israel from U.N. action and has already twice vetoed Security Council action since an October 7 attack by Hamas terrorists in which Israel says 1,200 people were killed and 240 people taken hostage.
Israel has retaliated against Hamas by bombarding Gaza from the air, imposing a siege and launching a ground offensive. Some 20,000 Palestinians have been killed, according to health officials in Hamas-ruled Gaza.
Most people in Gaza have been driven from their homes and U.N. officials have warned of a humanitarian catastrophe. The World Food Programme says half of Gaza’s population is starving and only 10% of the food required has entered Gaza since October 7.
A key sticking point during negotiations on the resolution adopted on Friday had been an initial proposal for U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to establish a mechanism in Gaza to monitor aid from countries not party to the war.
A toned-down compromise was reached to instead ask Guterres to appoint a senior humanitarian and reconstruction coordinator to establish a U.N. mechanism for accelerating aid to Gaza through states that are not party to the conflict.
The coordinator would also have responsibility ‘for facilitating, coordinating, monitoring, and verifying in Gaza, as appropriate, the humanitarian nature’ of all the aid.
The council also called for the warring parties ‘to adhere to international humanitarian law and … deplores all attacks against civilians and civilian objects, as well as all violence and hostilities against civilians, and all acts of terrorism.’
Lord Cameron said the adoption of a U.N. resolution calling for the immediate acceleration of aid deliveries to civilians in Gaza was ‘good news.’
The UK Foreign Secretary said: ‘It is good news that the U.N. has come together to back a resolution to get more humanitarian aid into Gaza.
Smoke billows above buildings following an Israeli air strike at the Al-Nuseirat refugee camp, along the Salah al-Din road, in central Gaza Strip, 22 December 2023
Residents of the refugee camp of Bureij arrive in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip following an evacuation order, on December 22, 2023
Aid trucks enter from Egypt en route to Gaza, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, as seen from the Kerem Shalom crossing, in Israel, December 22, 2023. The Kerem Shalom crossing between Israel and Gaza opened on Sunday for aid trucks for the first time since the outbreak of war
‘The UK is doing everything it can to get more aid in, as I saw when I visited Al Arish in Egypt, near the border with Gaza, this week. People across Gaza urgently need food, medicine and shelter. We have consistently argued for more aid and called on Israel to open more border crossings.
‘As well as the need for expanded humanitarian access, the U.N. resolution today demands the immediate and unconditional release of hostages. This is vital.
‘Crucially, the resolution also calls for steps towards a sustainable ceasefire. This is an outcome that I advocated for last week along with the German Foreign Minister and strongly think is the right approach.’
He thanked the UAE for its ‘leadership’ on the resolution, adding: ‘It has been a difficult process to reach agreement within the U.N. but there is now greater unity and purpose about what needs to happen to relieve the humanitarian crisis, and to start working towards the sustainable ceasefire that the British Government has argued for.’
After the UN vote, Israel said it would keep inspecting all Gaza aid ‘for security reasons’, and Israel’s ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan said ‘the UN cannot be trusted to monitor the incoming aid.’ Erdan thanked Washington for ‘maintaining defined red lines.’
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said this week there would be no ceasefire in Gaza until the ‘elimination’ of Hamas.
Guterres said on Friday, following the vote, that Israel’s offensive was the ‘real problem… creating massive obstacles’ to humanitarian shipments.’
‘The real problem is that the way Israel is conducting this offensive is creating massive obstacles to the distribution of humanitarian aid inside Gaza,’ he said.
‘A humanitarian ceasefire is the only way to begin to meet the desperate needs of people in Gaza and end their ongoing nightmare.’
Relatives of the Palestinians died in Israeli attacks, mourn as they receive the dead bodies from the morgue of Nasser Hospital for burial in Khan Yunis, Gaza on December 22, 2023
Palestinians carry a casualty near the site of an Israeli strike on a car, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip December 22, 2023
Volunteers prepare food for Palestinian families ,displaced to Southern Gaza due to Israeli attacks, between rubbles of destroyed buildings in Rafah, Gaza on December 22, 2023
A Palestinian child receive food distributed by volunteers for Palestinian families ,displaced to Southern Gaza due to Israeli attacks, between rubbles of destroyed buildings in Rafah, Gaza on December 22, 2023
The Palestinian envoy to the United Nations, Riyad Mansour, called the Security Council resolution ‘a step in the right direction’, adding that it ‘must be accompanied by massive pressure for an immediate ceasefire.’
And Hamas in a statement called the vote ‘an insufficient measure that does not respond to the catastrophic situation created by the Zionist (Israeli) war machine.’
Israel’s Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said in a statement that ‘Israel will continue to inspect, for security reasons, all humanitarian assistance to Gaza.’
Rights group Amnesty called the resolution ‘woefully insufficient in the face of the ongoing carnage and extensive destruction wrought by the government of Israel’s attacks.’
Fighting raged on Friday between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. The Hamas-run health ministry said more than 410 people had been killed in Israeli bombardment over 48 hours, including 16 in a strike Friday on the Gaza City district of Jabalia.
Four members of one family, including a girl, died in another strike on a civilian vehicle in Rafah in southern Gaza, the ministry said.
The fighting has displaced 1.9 million Gazans according to U.N. figures, out of a population of 2.4 million, and put out of action most of the 36 hospitals in the territory. Nine remain partly functioning, the World Health Organization says.
With swathes of Gaza reduced to rubble, the displaced have been forced into crowded shelters or tents, and are struggling to find food, fuel, water and medical supplies.
According to the U.N., the number of aid trucks entering Gaza is well below the daily pre-war average.
Last week Israel approved the temporary delivery of aid via Kerem Shalom crossing, and the army says on average 80 trucks enter Gaza through it daily.