US may feel it has to protect Israel with veto again as UAE prepares security council motion
The Biden administration faces a showdown at the UN security council in the next 48 hours at which it may feel impelled to use its veto to protect Israel by rejecting calls for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza.
The United Arab Emirates, the Arab country on the 15-strong security council, said it would table a resolution on Thursday for debate on Friday after the UN secretary general, António Guterres, and most Islamic states called for the ceasefire.
Guterres infuriated Israel on Thursday by taking the rare step of invoking article 99 of the UN charter to notify the security council that the crisis in Gaza represented a threat to world peace. It was the first time he had invoked the article since he became secretary general in 2017.
The US deputy envoy, Robert Wood, said the Biden administration did not support the Gaza issue being brought to the UN security council at this point. “We remain focused on the difficult and sensitive diplomacy geared to getting more hostages released, more aid flowing into Gaza and better protection of civilians,” he told Reuters.
The diplomatic price the US would have to pay for vetoing a ceasefire call is high, but Washington believes a ceasefire would leave Hamas entrenched in Gaza. It instead supports pauses so long as Hamas continues to release more of the hostages that it seized in its assault on Israel on 7 October.
Wood’s stance could put him at odds with the EU foreign affairs chief, Josep Borrell, who issued a statement supporting Guterres’s call. Guterres was also given support in social media statements from the heads of a broad array of UN agencies including the heads of the World Food Programme and the World Health Organization (WHO).
