US-led vote to condemn Hamas at UN draws ire of Palestinian militant group
Hamas condemned a coming Washington-backed United Nations vote on the group that controls Gaza.
The US will ask the UN to explicitly condemn Hamas, which has fought three wars with Israel since 2008, by name for the first time.
The measure – one of outgoing US ambassador Nikki Haley’s last actions at the UN – has won EU backing, according to the American mission to the world body.
The vote is seen as an attempt by Washington to justify its defence of Israel.
A draft text of the resolution asks UN members to “condemn Hamas for repeatedly firing rockets into Israel and for inciting violence, thereby putting civilians at risk”.
But Hamas officials decried the vote as another step that would allow Israel to continue its siege of the enclave.
“It is a useless attempt from the United States to convert the situation and accuse the victims instead of the criminal, which is Israel for its crimes against our people,” Yehya Mossa, a senior Hamas official, told The National. “We need to foil this resolution.”
Hazem Qassem, spokesman for the movement, said the US position in the Security Council in favour of Israel “makes it a real partner with Israel in committing crimes against our people”.
The resolution also demands that Hamas “and other militant actors including Palestinian Islamic Jihad cease all provocative actions and violent activity, including by using airborne incendiary devices”.
The latter is probably a reference to the firebomb balloons and kites that have been launched across the border from Gaza, the Palestinian territory that Hamas controls along with Israel.
Palestinians in Gaza view the balloons and kites as legitimate resistance against Israel’s more-than-decade-long blockade. Israel says those releasing them are guilty of terrorism and has responded militarily.
Monica Grayley, spokeswoman for the president of the UN General Assembly, said on Monday the resolution would be put to a vote among its 193 members tomorrow.
The US measure – a draft of which contains seven points – is likely to add to tension over the lack of progress towards peace between Israel and Palestinians.
The chances of it passing through the General Assembly – which on Friday alone adopted six separate resolutions condemning Israel – look slim, despite the EU’s agreement to support the US measure.
Adoption would require 97 votes from member states.
So-called non-aligned nations, which are a majority in the assembly, customarily follow the Palestinian lead in such votes.
Beyond its main two points, it also calls for “tangible steps towards intra-Palestinian reconciliation, including in support of the mediation efforts of Egypt, and concrete steps to reunite the Gaza Strip and the West Bank under the Palestinian Authority and ensure its effective functioning in the Gaza Strip”.
The administration of US President Donald Trump, however, is largely seen as hostile towards Palestinians, having earlier this year broken historical convention by moving the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
The US also cut funds to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, and closed the Palestine Liberation Organisation’s mission in Washington.
The US is reportedly getting ready to release its own plan to resolve the conflict, but Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has already dismissed the unpublished proposals, saying America is no longer regarded as an honest broker.
Ms Haley said in October that she would be leaving her post by the end of the year.
She routinely railed against the UN’s treatment of Israel. No successor has been named.
The resolution against Hamas would have been presented on Monday, but the Palestinian representative at the UN pushed for a delay, the US mission said.
“The issue before the United Nations on Thursday is not whether it supports one form or another of a Middle East peace plan,” it said.
“The issue is as plain as the resolution’s text.
“Each country will be asked to vote for or against the activities of Hamas, along with other militant groups like Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
“If the UN cannot bring itself to adopt this resolution, then it has no business being involved in peace discussions.”
The vote will be taken in the same week that a military court in the Gaza Strip sentenced six Palestinians, including a woman, to death by hanging for allegedly collaborating with Israel.