Dec. 22 (UPI) — The United Nations Security Council has again delayed a vote on a resolution calling for a halt in the fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, but the United States said that following a week of negations they now have a motion it can support.
“I wont share how I will vote, but it will be a resolution — if the resolution is put forward as is — that we can support,” Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the United States ambassador to the United Nations, told reporters Thursday night after emerging from another day of closed-door consultations.
The 15-nation Security Council has been negotiating on a United Arab Emirates’ resolution all week in order to avoid a U.S veto, as Washington has expressed objections to its wording. It has also twice used this power, which is only wielded by the council’s five permanent members, against resolutions over their lack of condemnation of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel that started the nearly 80-day war.
A vote on the UAE resolution was initially to be held Monday, but was pushed to Tuesday, and was again delayed each following day this week to allow the diplomats more time to hash out the agreement behind closed doors.
The vote is now expected to occur Friday.
Thomas-Greenfield assured reporters that the week of intense negotiations had not “watered down” the resolution.
“It will support the priority that Egypt has in ensuring that we put a mechanism on the ground that will support humanitarian assistance,” she said, referencing what was reportedly an issue holding up the vote as there has been negotiations on establishing a U.N. aid monitory body that is independent of the warning parties.
“The draft resolution is a very strong resolution that is fully supported by the Arab group that provides them what they feel is needed to get humanitarian assistance on the ground,” she said.
According to a U.N. report of the developments, the resolution originally called for a “cessation of hostilities” but has been edited to demand a “suspension” of the fighting, seemingly to increase access for humanitarian aid.
The United States has repeatedly said they want a resolution that is actionable and will have impact on the ground in Gaza, where the situation is continuing to deteriorate.
Under Israel’s brutal air and ground offensive, the death toll in Gaza has reached about 20,000, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-Run Palestine Ministry of Health. The war has also has displaced 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.2 million residents, according to stats from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
On Thursday, the United Nations’ World Food Program warned that more than one in four households in Gaza was facing “extreme hunger” and there is a risk of famine unless there is a surge of humanitarian aid.
The WFP’s Integrated Food Security Phase Classification report adds that about 26% of Gazans, representing 576,6000 people, were starving.
Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, told reporters that they hope the resolution that the Security Council agrees on will do something to address this problem.
“Obviously, what we would want to see is something that would facilitate the immediate, safe and unhindered delivery of humanitarian aid,” he said during a press conference earlier Thursday.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has said that the war will persist until “the elimination of Hamas.”
