UNGA backs Palestinian bid for membership
The UN General Assembly (UNGA) voted by a wide margin on Friday to grant new “rights and privileges” to Palestine and called on the Security Council to reconsider Palestine’s request to become the 194th member of the United Nations.
The 193-member world body approved the Arab and Palestinian-sponsored resolution by a vote of 143-9 with 25 abstentions. The United States voted against the resolution, along with Israel, Argentina, Czechia, Hungary, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau and Papua New Guinea.
UN chief Antonio Guterres also warned Gaza risked an “epic humanitarian disaster” on Friday as Israeli military operations around its far-southern city of Rafah effectively halted aid operations.
About 110,000 people have fled the city of Rafah for other parts of Gaza, as heavy fighting on the city’s outskirts leaves aid crossings inaccessible and food and fuel supplies grow critically low, a UN humanitarian official said. All crossings into southern Gaza remain effectively closed, cutting off supplies and preventing medical evacuations and the movement of humanitarian staff, said Georgios Petropoulos, an official for the UN’S Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs working in Rafah.
The vote reflected the wide global support for full membership of Palestine in the United Nations, with many countries expressing outrage at the escalating death toll in Gaza and fears of a major Israeli offensive in Rafah. But while it gives Palestine some new rights and privileges, it reaffirms that it remains a non-member observer state without the right to vote in the General Assembly or at any of its conferences. “I have stood hundreds of times before at this podium, but never for a more significant vote than the one about to take place, an historic one,” Palestinian ambassador to the UN Riyad Mansour said before the vote, his voice full of emotion. He added, “The day will come where Palestine will take its rightful place among the community of free nations.” Israel reacted angrily, with its UN ambassador, Gilad Erdan, saying the resolution made him sick.
In a separate development, the UAE has condemned in the strongest terms the attack by Israeli settlers on a Jordanian aid convey headed to the Gaza Strip through Beit Hanoun, and the attack on the headquarters of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) in occupied Jerusalem.
In a statement, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs affirmed it held Israel fully responsible for these heinous attacks, and called for an urgent, independent and transparent investigation, and punishment for those who committed these appalling crimes in contravention of international humanitarian law.
The Ministry commended the efforts of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan in supporting the brotherly Palestinians and the people of the Gaza Strip to confront the difficult humanitarian conditions.
The Ministry stressed the need for an immediate ceasefire, and for avoiding the targeting of civilians, organisations, civilian facilities, and relief organisations.
Earlier during the day, the UN warned that aid for the Gaza Strip could grind to a halt in days.
“For five days, no fuel and virtually no humanitarian aid entered the Gaza Strip, and we are scraping the bottom of the barrel,” said the Unicef Senior Emergency Coordinator in the Gaza Strip, Hamish Young. Aid agencies say the battle has put hundreds of thousands of already displaced civilians in harm’s way.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said his country is willing to “stand alone” and “fight with our fingernails” in the war on Gaza, in response to President Joe Biden’s warning that the US could stop supplying him with arms.
Biden threatened on Wednesday to halt supplies of bombs and artillery shells if Israeli forces go ahead with a full-scale assault on the southern Gazan city of Rafah. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to proceed with the Rafah offensive with or without US arms.
South Africa has asked the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to order Israel to withdraw from Rafah as part of additional emergency measures over the war in Gaza, the UN’S top court said on Friday.
Police dismantled encampments and arrested dozens of pro-palestinian protesters at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Pennsylvania on Friday morning, in the latest crackdowns on protests roiling US campuses.
‘The day will come when Palestine will take its rightful place among the community of free nations,’ says Palestinian ambassador to the UN Riyad Mansour; UAE slams settler attacks on aid convoy en route to Gaza.