US vetoes UN Security Council demand for Gaza ceasefire
The US on Wednesday vetoed a draft UN Security Council resolution that demanded an "immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire" between Israel and Hamas in Gaza and unhindered aid access.
The other 14 countries on the Council voted in favour of the draft as a humanitarian crisis grips the enclave of more than 2 million people, where famine looms and aid has only trickled in since Israel lifted an 11-week blockade last month.
"The US has been clear: We would not support any measure that fails to condemn Hamas and does not call for Hamas to disarm and leave Gaza," Acting US Ambassador to the UN Dorothy Shea told the Council before the vote, arguing that it would also undermine US-led efforts to broker a ceasefire.
Washington is Israel's biggest ally and arms supplier.
The Security Council vote came as Israel pushes ahead with an offensive in Gaza after ending a two-month truce in March. Gaza health authorities said Israeli strikes killed 45 people on Wednesday, while Israel said a soldier died in fighting.
Britain's UN Ambassador Barbara Woodward criticised the Israeli government's decisions to expand its military operations in Gaza and severely restrict humanitarian aid as "unjustifiable, disproportionate and counterproductive".
Israel has rejected calls for an unconditional or permanent ceasefire, saying Hamas cannot stay in Gaza. Israel's UN Ambassador Danny Danon told the council members who voted in favour of the draft: "You chose appeasement and submission. You chose a road that does not lead to peace. Only to more terror."
Hamas condemned the US veto, describing it as showing "the US administration's blind bias" towards Israel. The draft Security Council resolution had also demanded the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages held by Hamas and others.
Rival and Operations
The war in Gaza has raged since 2023 after Hamas killed 1,200 people in Israel in an October 7 attack and took some 250 hostages back to the enclave, according to Israeli tallies.
Israel responded with a military campaign that has killed over 54,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities. They say civilians have borne the brunt of the attacks and that thousands more bodies have been lost under rubble.
Under global pressure, Israel allowed limited UN-led deliveries to resume on May 19. A week later a controversial new aid distribution system was launched by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, backed by the US and Israel.
Israel has long accused Hamas of stealing aid, which the group denies. Israel and the US are urging the UN to work through the GHF, which is using private US security and logistics companies to transport aid into Gaza for distribution at so-called secure distribution sites.
"No one wants to see Palestinian civilians in Gaza go hungry or thirsty," Shea told the Security Council, adding that the draft resolution did not "acknowledge the disastrous shortcomings of the prior method of aid delivery".
The UN and international aid groups have refused to work with the GHF because they say it is not neutral.
No aid was distributed by the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation on Wednesday as it pressed the Israeli military to boost civilian safety beyond the perimeter of its so-called secure distribution sites after a deadly incident on Tuesday.
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Middle East Eye
34 minutes ago
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Middle East Eye
34 minutes ago
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French woman files complaint against Israel over killing of grandchildren in Gaza
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Middle East Eye
2 hours ago
- Middle East Eye
British Palestinians demand UK action as Gaza relatives face starvation
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While UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has pronounced Israel's blockade on Gaza 'intolerable', Farajallah said they have been 'neglected' by the government, which has rejected their calls for the creation of the scheme. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters 'For us, its like torture,' Farajallah told Middle East Eye. 'We are not talking about huge numbers, when we created our list of the family members we wanted to bring to the UK, it was less than 2000 people'. Farajallah spoke alongside a panel of British Palestinians and their families, patched in from Gaza via Zoom calls, at a conference on Thursday calling on the UK government to impose sanctions and a total arms embargo on Israel. 'Nearly every member of the community here in the UK has close family members in Gaza, mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters' Farajallah said. 'For the last 600 days, we have lived in constant fear, checking with our families every day, not a single day passed without fear.' 'Today, after 600 days of uncertainty, we know one thing for sure, if this starvation continues, our families will not survive, not for weeks, but days'. 'I'm losing myself' Ali Mousa, a 30-year-old British Palestinian who lives in Manchester, struggles to stay in contact with his sister Hend, a teacher at an Unrwa school in Gaza. Internet and power outages mean calls are sporadic. In the periods of silence, he fears she could have been killed in a strike or have collapsed from hunger. Hend, a 29-year-old mother of three who addressed the conference via a patchy Zoom call, said she was at her home near Mawasi, west of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, expecting imminent forced expulsion orders. 'If this happens, where will my family and I go?' she said. She described how her three-year-old asks her every morning if they will have breakfast. 'Unfortunately, my answer is always no,' Hend said. Gaza: US-backed aid group suspends food distribution for a second day Read More » As a school teacher, Hend said she is also confronted with her students' suffering on a daily basis. She conducts her classes with students sat on the floor, which she also uses as a blackboard. In one of her classes, a student lost consciousness because he hadn't eaten for two days. When another student didn't complete an online test, Hend contacted the boy's mother to ask what had happened. The mother replied that he had been killed. 'I feel like I'm losing myself,' she said. Wafaa Shamallakh, 38, an Arabic interpreter who works for Kingston Council and whose siblings are in southern Gaza, described how her husband-in-law and her 15-year-old nephew were forced to walk over an hour just to reach an aid distribution point. 'Hundreds of thousands of people had come there from the north and south of Gaza, desperate to find a bag of flour, a little sugar, maybe some pasta,' Shamallakh said. Drones flew overhead, firing at them. 'They came back empty handed; no food, no flour, nothing. They had to run for their lives'. 'This is what it means to survive in Gaza,' Shamallakh said. 'Beyond anything I've seen' Dr Rossel Mohrij, a plastic and reconstructive surgeon who volunteered at Gaza's Nasser Hospital in December 2024, described amputating limbs with blunt instruments and without sterile dressing. 'We used cling film to dress wounds, vinegar for infection,' she told the conference. The doctor recalled being inundated with casualties following an air strike targeting a nearby school where displaced families were sheltering. 'It was beyond anything I've seen, I will carry it with me forever,' Mohrij told the conference. 'A flood of the dead, dying, the dismembered. Children too stunned to cry, staring at their missing body parts'. She described standing at the bed of a child, who had been stuck under the rubble and presented late with severe burns to his legs. 'They were so severe, the blood supply to his legs was restricted'. 'Me, some other visiting surgeons, some local surgeons, stood at his feet, debating how to make his death less excruciating,' she said. "A flood of the dead, dying, the dismembered. Children too stunned to cry, staring at their missing body parts," - Dr Rossel Mohrij, plastic and reconstructive surgeon 'He did not understand our words but I guess he felt our despair. He quietly covered his face with a white cloth to block the world out. He died the next morning'. For Farajallah, and many other British Palestinians, Starmer's pledges to ensure the flow of aid to Gaza and to secure a ceasefire are no more than a 'political show'. Despite Starmer's condemnation of Israel's attacks on Palestinian aid seekers over the past week, the government is so far resisting calls for a total arms embargo and recognition of Palestine. At the conference, the voices from Gaza were shaking with grief, but were also defiant. They were not asking for pity, but for action. 'Let this be not another press conference where we beg for basic humanity. Let this be a turning point where Britain stops whispering about international law and starts upholding it. Because the people of Gaza are not waiting for your sympathy,' Shamallakh said. Mousa turned to his sister, Hend, saying, 'I want to speak directly to you. We are here for you, and we will never leave you, even if your whole world does'.
