To be fully admitted to the United Nations, Palestine had to be able to count on a positive recommendation from the Security Council (nine green lights and no vetoes)
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The United States they placed the veto on a Security Council resolutionUNwhich would pave the way for Palestine’s full membership in the United Nations.
The short draft, presented by Algeria, was a success 12 votes in favor (Algeria, China, Ecuador, France, Japan, Guyana, Malta, Mozambique, Russia, Sierra Leone, Slovenia, South Korea), 2 abstentions (Great Britain and Switzerland) and the United States veto.
L’Algerian ambassador to the United Nations. Amar Bendjama, the Arab representative to the Council who introduced the resolution, said that “peace will come from the inclusion of Palestine, not its exclusion.” But the outcome of the vote was as expected.
To be admitted to the United Nations as a full member, Palestine had to be able to count on a positive recommendation from the Security Council (nine green lights and no vetoes) to then be approved by the General Assembly with a two-thirds majority.
The resolution aimed to raise the status of the Palestinians from a non-member observer state to a full member.
“Unjust, immoral and unjustified”, this is how the Palestinian presidency commented on the US veto.
The United States’ no on Palestine at the UN Security Council
The Deputy US Ambassador Robert Wood told the Council that the US veto “does not reflect opposition to the creation of a Palestinian state, but is instead a recognition that this can only happen through direct negotiations between the parties“.
This is the second Palestinian attempt to become a full member and comes as the war in Gaza has put the more than 75-year-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict front and center.
The voices in favor of Palestine
L’Russian ambassador to the United Nations Vassily Nebenzia he spoke in favor of granting Palestine full membership in the Security Council, saying that “the absolute majority of the global community” also supports it.
By exercising the veto, the United States shows that it is serving Israel’s exclusive interests, Nebenzia said.
Egypt expressed “deep regret” over the United Nations Security Council’s failure to pass the resolution recognizing a Palestinian state as a full member of the United Nations.
In a statement, Egypt’s Foreign Ministry said the approval of Palestine’s application to become a full member of the United Nations is a crucial step and “it is an intrinsic right of the Palestinian people“.
Meanwhile, in Gaza
At least six people have been killed in Israeli attacks on the Shati and Nuseirat refugee camps, in central Gazaand many others were injured.
The Palestinian news agency Wafa published a video on Thursday, April 18, showing Gaza residents returning to their homes to assess the damage after the withdrawal of the Israeli army from Nuseirat. The video shows the devastation of the camp, with people trying to recover personal belongings among the rubble of the buildings.
Gaza civil defense teams said they recovered three bodies from under the rubble of a “family house” in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood of Gaza City that was hit in an Israeli airstrike.
According to the United Nations, the conflict caused the displacement of 85% of the territory’s populationin a situation of serious shortage of food, drinking water and medicines, while most of the enclave’s infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed.
Gaza’s Health Ministry said Thursday that at least 33,970 people were killed in the territory during more than six months of war, 71 in the last 24 hours.
Tags: Security Council veto Palestinian membership United Nations
