UN Security Council approves US proposal for ceasefire in Gaza | International

The United Nations Security Council has approved a resolution supporting the three-phase peace proposal for Gaza that President Joe Biden detailed ten days ago, by fourteen votes in favor, none against, and Russia abstaining. “This is an opportunity to go the other way. Hamas – the Palestinian radical guerrillas also known as the Islamic Resistance Movement – ​​should accept it,” US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas Greenfield declared after the vote. “The United States will ensure that Israel fulfills its international obligations, assuming Hamas accepts this deal.”

“Palestinian lives matter,” Algeria’s representative, Amr Bendjama, declared after the vote, recalling the more than 37,000 Palestinians killed in eight months of war, “We voted in favour of this resolution because it represents a step forward for an immediate and lasting ceasefire.” Israeli diplomat Ruud Shapir Ben Naftali said that “it is Hamas that is prolonging this war. Hamas and only Hamas.” He added that Israel “will not engage in any endless or futile negotiations that could be used by Hamas to buy time.”

It is the fourth time the Security Council has approved a resolution on Gaza since the start of the war last October, although the previous three times have remained vacant due to Israel’s refusal to halt its offensive on the Strip, which has already left more than 37,000 dead, more than double that number injured and most infrastructure and buildings destroyed. In March, the body demanded an immediate ceasefire and the unconditional release of hostages held by Hamas since the October 7 attacks.

In a statement issued by Hamas, the movement welcomed the new proposal and assured that it is ready to cooperate with the mediators to implement the principles of the ceasefire plan.

The resolution expresses its support for the three-phase ceasefire proposal, which “has been accepted by Israel, calls on Hamas to also accept it, and urges both parties to implement its terms without delay and without conditions.”

“We cannot wait any longer. With each passing day the needless suffering continues,” Thomas Greenfield said before the vote. She had declared moments earlier, “Palestinian civilians are living in hell.”

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The United States has unleashed its full diplomatic machinery in an attempt to achieve progress that will end the war in Gaza once and for all, which is becoming a huge electoral burden for the White House five months before the election and risks costing the Democratic president another four years in office.

Most polls indicate that Biden is trailing his opponent, Republican Donald Trump, while the progressive wing of the Democratic Party rebukes its leader for his support for Israel despite the violent methods of that country’s forces. This weekend, hundreds of people demonstrated in front of the presidential residence demanding a ceasefire and a halt to military aid to Israel. Vice President Kamala Harris was harassed by a pro-Palestinian activist during a visit to Michigan, a state with the highest proportion of Arab American voters in the entire country and which could be crucial in the November elections: polls suggest that, partly because of dissatisfaction with Biden’s policy in the Middle East, Trump will prevail in that region four years after the current president won the 2020 elections.

While presenting the proposed resolution before the UN Security Council, Secretary of State Antony Blinken was in Jerusalem negotiating with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to persuade him to vote “yes” to President Joe Biden’s three-phase peace proposal detailed at the White House ten days ago.

In the meeting between Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this Monday, the head of US diplomacy reiterated to his interlocutor the need for Israel to approve a ceasefire proposal in three phases. Blinken “reiterated that the United States and other world leaders maintain their support for the plan”, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said in a statement.

Blinken arrived in Jerusalem from Cairo, where he met with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to press him to persuade Hamas to approve the resolution, which Washington considers its best asset to end the war. The secretary of state plans to continue his tour, his eighth to the Middle East since the conflict began, to Jordan and Qatar, the other key mediators in talks for a cessation of hostilities in the Strip.

a distant peace

But the prospects for a peace proposal now seem more remote than ever as President Joe Biden appeared at the White House to detail each of its three phases: The first, over six weeks, will impose a temporary ceasefire during which the flow of humanitarian aid into the Strip will increase and the swap of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners for Israeli hostages held by Hamas in the October attacks will be completed. The second phase will impose a permanent ceasefire and complete the hostage swap. The third phase will be reconstruction.

The future of the peace plan, which was drafted by Israel but intellectually written by the United States, was already uncertain. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had repeatedly stressed that his government would not accept Hamas unless it was completely destroyed. And this weekend’s events have complicated his prospects and opened a new chasm between the parties: The release of four Israeli hostages released in Gaza this weekend has strengthened the prime minister’s tough stance. The resignation of opposition leader Benny Gantz as minister without portfolio has tilted the war cabinet even further to the right and is more reluctant to make concessions of any kind. And the deaths of more than 270 Palestinians in the rescue operation, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, also harden the position of the Islamic Resistance Movement.

Given the distance between the parties, the Biden administration is considering a plan B in the event of the failure of the proposal: reaching at least an agreement with Hamas for the release of five hostages of dual American and Israeli nationality, according to the network NBC television.

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