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The USA is again preventing a resolution in the UN Security Council that calls for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza - and the hostage deal is stalling.
The United States on Tuesday vetoed for the third time a UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.
They argue it would undermine ongoing U.S.-led negotiations for a six-week pause in fighting under which Hamas would release more than 100 remaining Israeli hostages in exchange for detained Palestinians and additional humanitarian aid for civilians.
The resolution, introduced by Algeria on behalf of the Arab group of U.N. members, "would send a wrong message to Hamas," said U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, and "would give it something it asked for without giving it one." would have to provide something in return.”
U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield (center front) votes against a Gaza-related draft Security Council resolution at U.N. headquarters in New York on February 20, 2024.
© Xinhua/Imago
USA wants to introduce its own resolution on Gaza after veto in the UN Security Council
Instead, Thomas-Greenfield urged council members to support an alternative U.S. resolution, which is still being drafted.
It demands that Israel - in addition to agreeing to a "temporary ceasefire as soon as possible" to enable the release of the hostages - refrain from a major ground offensive in Rafah and take "immediate measures" to prevent the unimpeded flow of humanitarian aid into the enclave through additional access points on land and water.
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So far, the US's direct appeals to Israel on all of these points have met with little positive response, at least from the public.
President Biden, under pressure at home and abroad to use U.S. influence more effectively, has become increasingly direct, calling Israeli military tactics "excessive," even as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he will not bow to international demands until then no complete victory over Hamas has been achieved.
Other Security Council members criticize the USA, only Great Britain abstains
The United States was the only one to oppose calls for an immediate ceasefire and demanded more time for negotiations.
With the exception of Britain, which abstained, the remaining 15 members of the Council voted in favor of the Algerian resolution, which also called for the release of all hostages.
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In angry and sad speeches, ambassadors from one nation after another made it clear that they were fed up. "The human suffering and humanitarian situation in Gaza is unbearable and Israeli operations must stop," said French Ambassador Nicolas de Rivière, after voting for the resolution.
"It is not that there is no overarching consensus in the Security Council, but rather it is the exercise of the veto by the United States that has stifled consensus in the council," said China's envoy Zhang Jun.
The veto was a “glaring example of double standards,” said Egyptian Ambassador Osama Mahmoud Abdel Khalek Mahmoud, whose government, along with Qatar and the United States, is involved in hostage negotiations between Israel and Hamas.
Mahmoud expressed “disappointment and frustration with the US obstruction.”
Far from hindering discussion of the hostages' release, he said, the vetoed resolution would have created "favorable conditions for their success."
Egypt and Qatar dissatisfied: hostage deal negotiations stall
The negotiations themselves, initially expected to move quickly after a proposed “framework” was presented to Israel and Hamas nearly three weeks ago, have not gone well.
“We have made some good progress in the last few weeks, but the last few days have not gone as expected,” Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday.
If an agreement can be reached on the outstanding issues "in the next few days," he said, "I believe we can see an agreement very soon."
... But the last few days haven’t really been promising.”
On Tuesday, the Biden administration sent one of its key weapons on the issue - National Security Council Middle East coordinator Brett McGurk - to Cairo and Tel Aviv "to see if we can get this hostage deal done," he said Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters at the White House.
“We are currently in a very delicate phase in which these discussions are taking place.”
New US resolution also calls for a temporary ceasefire for the first time
The United States is seeking to extend the week-long pause in Israel's Gaza war in November that led to the release of 105 hostages - women and children - captured by Hamas during its Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel.
This attack claimed around 1,200 Israeli lives and triggered a massive military retaliation.
The new framework provides for a six-week cessation of hostilities.
The proposed U.S. resolution mentions for the first time a “ceasefire,” albeit a temporary one that Biden administration officials hope will last long enough to lead to a permanent solution.
An administration official, speaking anonymously to discuss sensitive diplomatic matters, called the U.S. draft resolution a "positive vision" that would make demands of both Israel and Hamas and a firm commitment to a long-term solution for lasting peace and the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip.
Thomas-Greenfield invited other governments to consider the document but gave no indication of when it might be put to a vote.
World Food Program aid deliveries to northern Gaza suspended
Ongoing Israeli operations in the Gaza Strip have left nearly 30,000 dead, according to Gaza health officials.
Hundreds of thousands of civilians fled to the southern Gaza Strip as Israel began its air and ground strikes in the north, but an estimated 300,000 people remain there.
While aid deliveries have been difficult throughout the enclave, little aid has been able to arrive in the northern Gaza Strip due to ongoing fighting, destroyed roads and Israeli denial of passage.
After the World Food Program's trucks were attacked by civilian looters, it said on Tuesday it was suspending what it called life-saving aid deliveries to northern Gaza for security reasons as desperation in Gaza reached unprecedented levels.
Israeli UN Ambassador: “In Gaza, Hamas is the UN and the UN is Hamas”
Israel has repeatedly said that sufficient aid has been provided and accused UNRWA, the UN agency that primarily distributes humanitarian aid to the Palestinians, of collaborating with Hamas and allowing it to siphon off the aid.
“UNRWA is a terrorist organization,” Israeli UN Ambassador Gilad Erdan told the Security Council on Tuesday.
“In Gaza, Hamas is the UN and the UN is Hamas.”
Many of those who fled the destruction in the north are now crowding into tents, makeshift shelters and the streets of Rafah on the Egyptian border after Israel shifted the focus of its offensive to the southern town of Khan Younis to target Hamas leaders hunt who are said to have entrenched themselves in a network of tunnels.
US: No attack on Rafah without a credible plan to protect civilians
“Absolutely nothing has changed in our desire to eliminate the threat from Hamas,” Kirby said.
“We don’t believe the Hamas leadership should get away scot-free here after what happened on October 7th.”
However, he reiterated Biden's warning to Israel not to attack Rafah without a "credible and feasible plan" to protect civilians.
“We do not support major operations in Rafah that do not adequately consider the security of the over one million people who have taken refuge there,” he said.
“I am not aware of any credible plan that would do this at this time.”
Kirby said McGurk will repeat that message when he arrives in Israel on Thursday.
Netanyahu: Canceling the Rafah offensive means defeat
Netanyahu has said that calling off or delaying the Rafah offensive would be tantamount to telling Israel that it is “losing the war” against Hamas.
On Tuesday, he reiterated that Israel would not change course.
“We are determined to continue the war until we achieve all of its objectives,” Netanyahu said.
“There is no pressure, no one who can change this.”
Israel has indicated that an offensive in Rafah would take place before March 10, the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
This is the crucial date for an agreement on the hostages.
Israel called Hamas's counterproposal to release 1,500 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons "delusional."
The negotiating framework stipulates that three prisoners will be released for each hostage - the same conditions as the hostage break in November.
Officials say humanitarian aid is currently the biggest problem, with Hamas demanding at least 500 trucks enter the Gaza Strip every day.
Negotiators fear that unless new routes are opened, it will be difficult to get beyond the current figure of 200 on a good day.
About the author
Karen DeYoung
is an associate editor and senior national security correspondent at The Post.
In more than three decades at the newspaper, she served as bureau chief in Latin America and London and as a White House, U.S. foreign policy and intelligence correspondent.
We are currently testing machine translations. This article was automatically translated from English into German.
This article was first published in English on February 21, 2024 at the “Washingtonpost.com” - as part of a cooperation, it is now also available in translation to readers of the IPPEN.MEDIA portals.