By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News
NEW YORK (Worthy News) – The United States on Wednesday vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire in Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza because it was not linked to the immediate release of hostages.
Fourteen of the Security Council’s 15 members, including U.S. allies Britain and France, voted “yes,” but the veto doomed the vote.
The U.S. voted against it, saying the resolution overlooked those taken captive by Hamas fighters in Israel on October 7, 2023.
U.S. Deputy Ambassador Robert Wood said the United States worked for weeks to avoid vetoing the resolution sponsored by the council’s 10 elected members and expressed regret that compromise language was not accepted.
“We made clear throughout negotiations we could not support an unconditional cease-fire that failed to release the hostages,” he said.
“Hamas would have seen it as a vindication of its cynical strategy to hope and pray the international community forgets about the fate of more than 100 hostages from more than 20 member states who have been held for 410 days.”
The resolution does call for the release of all hostages, but observers said the wording suggests that their release would come only after a cease-fire.
FOUTH VETO
The veto was the fourth time the United States blocked an effort by the Council to demand a cease-fire since the war began over a year ago.
The armed conflict was triggered by Hamas attacking Israel, killing some 1,200 people and taking more than 200 people hostage in the worst atrocity against Jews since the Holocaust, or Shoah.
More than 40,000 people have been killed in Gaza throughout the war, according to the Hamas-run health authorities, but those figures have been
difficult to verify independently.
Israel says nearly half of those killed in Israeli strikes are Hamas fighters, often hiding among civilians.
United Nations officials have warned that the territory “faces the risk of famine” unless a ceasefire is implemented.
Israel says it allows humanitarian aid to enter Gaza but that many packages have been taken by Hamas or sold for high prices at markets.
Copyright 1999-2024 Worthy News. This article was originally published on Worthy News and was reproduced with permission.
More Worthy News
Ukraine fired a dozen British Storm Shadow cruise missiles deep into Russia on Wednesday after launching it is U.S. ATACMS missiles, prompting Moscow to warn that it is lowering its threshold for the use of atomic weapons.
President-elect Donald J. Trump has selected Mike Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas, to serve as his U.S. ambassador to Israel during mounting tensions in the Middle East.
Tehran has condemned three European nations for pursuing a new censure resolution against Iran at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) after a leaked report showed the country is expanding its stockpile of uranium enriched to near-weapons-grade levels.
California and the Pacific Northwest are facing severe weather, power outages, and falling trees amid a “bomb cyclone” which began to bear down on the region on Tuesday and is expected to last until Friday, the Associated Press reports.
The United States on Wednesday vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire in Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza because it was not linked to the immediate release of hostages.
A detailed report by the US Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) published this month states that the Biden-Harris administration has been aware of a recent “dramatic” increase in illegal child labor among migrant children but has taken no meaningful action to prevent it. Moreover, the report asserts the Biden-Harris administration has failed to cooperate with state and local investigations into the exploitation and trafficking of unaccompanied migrant children (UCs) and has even obstructed congressional oversight of the issue.
The Texas Land Commissioner has contacted President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming administration to say that the state will make available more than 1,400 acres of land to serve as a landing stage on which detention centers could be built to facilitate what Trump promised would be the largest mass deportation of undocumented people in US history.