Sunday Times 2
Israel threatens to defy yet another Security Council resolution
View(s):By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS – The UN Security Council (UNSC) resolution for a temporary cease-fire in the ongoing conflict in Gaza—adopted last week by a 14-0 vote with the US abstaining—marks a significant step forward in momentarily halting the five-month-old fighting that has claimed the lives of over 32,000 Palestinians and 1,200 inside Israel.
But a lingering question remains: what will be the response from Israel, a country which has been accused of war crimes, genocide and ethnic cleansing and which has continued to defy the United Nations?
Israel has had a longstanding notoriety for flouting UNSC resolutions—and still never having to pay a price for such violations—primarily because of the unyielding support of the United States.
Dr. Stephen Zunes, Professor of Politics at the University of San Francisco, has written extensively and authoritatively on the politics of the Security Council. He said: “By my count, Israel has initially stood in violation of as many as 40 UN Security Council resolutions for at least a decade following their passage, though they eventually came into compliance with about a dozen of those. They remain in violation of the others.”
Successive US administrations, including the Biden administration, have made it clear they would veto any UN Security Council resolution that would impose sanctions or any other kind of pressure to force Israel into compliance, he said.
While it is certainly a positive development that the Biden administration did not veto Monday’s Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire, as it has previously, the United States again demonstrated its isolation in the international community by being the only country to not vote in favour, Dr. Zunes said.
The Biden administration threatened to veto the original draft resolution calling for a permanent ceasefire, only agreeing to not cast a veto in return for dropping the word “permanent.”
White House spokesperson John Kirby said the United States did not vote in favour because the resolution did not condemn Hamas, despite the fact that it did not condemn Israel either.
This is no doubt a reflection of the growing domestic and international pressure the Biden administration has been facing over its support for Israel’s horrific war on the people of Gaza.
Whatever the wording of the resolution, however, it is unlikely that Israel will abide by it, and the United States would certainly veto any attempt by the United Nations to enforce it,” Dr. Zunes declared.
At a UN news briefing on Wednesday, the UN Spokesperson was asked: Now that Israel did not pay any attention to the Security Council resolution, nor to the provisional measures of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), and did not respond to any of the UN’s appeals, “what else can the UN do to oblige this state that treats itself above international law?”
As far as the Secretary-General is concerned, said Stephane Dujarric, his authority is clear in the Charter, and he has been very clear in his calls on all parties, including Israel, to implement the resolution.
But the Secretary-General’s voice has remained a voice in the wilderness.
Not surprisingly, Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on X (formerly Twitter) that his country would not abide by the resolution. “The state of Israel will not cease fire,” Katz said. “We will destroy Hamas and continue to fight until the last of the hostages returns home.”
Meanwhile, according to a report on Cable News Network (CNN), US officials have gone to great lengths to say that the resolution isn’t binding. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller repeatedly said during a news conference that the resolution is non-binding before conceding that the technical details are for international lawyers to determine.
Similarly, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby and Washington’s UN envoy Linda Thomas-Greenfield separately insisted that the resolution is non-binding.
China’s UN ambassador Zhang Jun countered that such resolutions are indeed binding. Deputy UN spokesperson Farhan Haq said Security Council resolutions are international law, “so to that extent they are as binding as international law is.”
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the outspoken US Representative of President Biden’s Democratic Party, last week lashed out at Israel, accusing the Jewish state of “genocide”.
She called on Biden to cut off US military aid to Israel unless and until it begins to allow the free flow of humanitarian assistance into a devastated Gaza.
Oxfam’s UN Representative and Head of New York Office, Brenda Mofya, said: “We welcome the Security Council’s adoption of a ceasefire resolution so Palestinians in Gaza can have much-needed respite from the relentless and devastating Israeli violence and critical aid can reach them”.
However, this resolution, while a step in the right direction, falls short of the permanent ceasefire which is truly required and comes too late for the over 32,000 Palestinians who have been killed in Gaza and thousands more unaccounted for, while the Security Council wrung its hands over semantics, she argued.
“For nearly six months, the rest of the international community has repeatedly called for a permanent ceasefire, the release of all hostages, and the provision of unrestricted aid into Gaza. It is long overdue for UN Security Council Member States to finally heed these calls with the moral leadership that is rightfully expected of them and to stop the killing and suffering in Gaza.
“Now that this resolution has passed, it is imperative for Member States to fulfil their obligations to ensure that it is implemented so that Palestinians never endure violence such as this again. This includes immediately halting the transfer of weapons, parts, and ammunition to Israel and Palestinian armed groups,” she said.
Louis Charbonneau, UN director at Human Rights Watch, said Israel needs to immediately respond to the UN Security Council resolution by facilitating the delivery of humanitarian aid, ending its starvation of Gaza’s population, and halting unlawful attacks.
Palestinian armed groups should immediately release all civilians held hostage. The US and other countries should use their leverage to end atrocities by suspending arms transfers to Israel, said Charbonneau.