US Ready to Back Diluted Resolution on More Aid to Gaza

AFP/APP

United Nations: After week-long, closed-door negotiations at the UN Security Council, the United States has indicated it will back a watered-down resolution on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, calling for more lifesaving aid for Gaza, but some countries want a stronger text that would include the now-eliminated call for a truce.

With conditions deteriorating in Gaza, the 15-member Council, which has been locked in negotiations on the UAE-sponsored resolution, is now expected to vote on Friday.

After four postponements of the vote as negotiations continued, diplomats said an agreement was struck late Thursday with the U.S. that could allow the resolution to be adopted.

U.S. Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield told reporters that it was “a resolution that we can support,” but she declined to specify if that meant the U.S. would vote in favour or abstain, which would allow the resolution to be adopted.

Still, some nations want a stronger text, as the latest draft removes calls for the urgent and sustainable cessation of hostilities. “Given the significant changes, many countries said they needed to consult their capitals before a vote.

The latest draft calls for urgent steps to immediately allow safe and unhindered humanitarian access and also for creating the conditions for a sustainable cessation of hostilities.”

Meanwhile, UN agencies said that Gaza’s entire population of 2.3 million people is at imminent risk of famine as battles rage between Israeli forces and Palestinian fighters across most of the enclave. 

The Ministry of Health in Gaza said that 20,057 Palestinians have been killed and 53,320 wounded in Israeli attacks since October 7, when the current conflict broke out. 

The UNSC vote on the United Arab Emirates-sponsored resolution was set to take place on Monday but has been delayed every day this week because of disagreements over language. The latest draft does not call for an end to the fighting, a change made to appease Washington, which has vetoed previous calls for a ceasefire.

The Russian and Palestinian ambassadors are reportedly not happy with these changes.

According to media reports, a further sticking point for diplomats negotiating the draft resolution has been the setting up of a UN monitoring mechanism, which would be responsible for assessing the effectiveness of aid delivery at scale, independent of either Israeli or Hamas authorities in Gaza.

The last draft to go up for a vote was vetoed by the US on December 8, which was quickly followed by action in the UN General Assembly four days later, when Member States voted by an overwhelming majority in favour of an immediate humanitarian ceasefire through a non-binding resolution. 

The Emergency Special Session of the Assembly resumed and then adjourned on Wednesday, with dozens of countries making statements on the crisis. 

The Council has been negotiating throughout the week to find language that will avoid a further US veto. It first introduced a draft that called for a cessation of hostilities, which now calls for a suspension of fighting, to vastly increase access to lifesaving aid. 

The US argued on Tuesday and in previous deadlocked sessions that any resolution must condemn the Hamas group’s attacks on October 7, which sparked this deadly and unprecedented surge in the Palestine-Israel conflict.

Pakistan and several other countries, who are critical of Israel’s offensive, have argued in response that any resolution condemning Hamas must also condemn the Israeli occupation and the thousands of civilian deaths resulting from Israel’s military action since October 7. 

As of Thursday, there are no functioning hospitals left in the north of the enclave, and injured parents stranded in facilities are “waiting to die” there, according to the UN health agency.