The UN Security Council on Monday afternoon overwhelmingly approved a US resolution that welcomes a proposal for a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas. The US says Israel has accepted the three-phase plan announced by US President Joe Biden, and Hamas welcomed it in a statement shortly after the council's vote.
The resolution urges both Israel and Hamas "to fully implement its terms without delay and without condition." US Secretary of State Antony Blinken also began a new visit to the region on Monday in the shadow of the dramatic rescue of four Israeli hostages held in Gaza and turmoil in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government.
Blinken met with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi in Cairo, but neither made public remarks. Blinken will also travel to Israel, Jordan and Qatar. While Biden, Blinken, and other US officials have praised the hostage rescue, the operation resulted in the deaths of a large number of Palestinian civilians. It may complicate the cease-fire push by emboldening Israel and hardening Hamas' resolve to carry on fighting in the war it initiated with its Oct. 7 attack into Israel.
Russia abstained from the UN vote, while the remaining 14 Security Council members voted in favor of the resolution supporting a three-phase ceasefire plan laid out by Biden on May 31 that he described as an Israeli initiative.
"Today we voted for peace," US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield told the council after the vote.
Algeria, the only Arab member of the council, supported the resolution because "we believe it can represent a step forward toward an immediate and lasting ceasefire," Algeria's UN Ambassador Amar Bendjama told the council. "It offers a glimmer of hope to the Palestinians," he said. "It's time to halt the killing."
The resolution also goes into detail about the proposal, and spells out that "if the negotiations take longer than six weeks for phase one, the ceasefire will still continue as long as negotiations continue."
However, it did not contain enough detail for Moscow. Russia's UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia asked what Israel had specifically agreed to and said the Security Council should not be signing up to agreements with "vague parameters."
"We did not wish to block the resolution simply because it, as much as we understand, is supported by the Arab world," Nebenzia told the council. Israel's UN Ambassador Gilad Erdan was present for the vote, but did not address the council. Instead, senior Israeli UN diplomat Reut Shapir Ben Naftaly told the body that Israel's goals in Gaza had always been clear.
"Israel is committed to these goals – to free all the hostages, to destroy Hamas' military and governing capabilities and to ensure that Gaza does not pose a threat to Israel in the future," she said. "It is Hamas that is preventing this war from ending. Hamas and Hamas alone."
Hamas welcomed the adoption of the US.-drafted resolution and said in a statement that it is ready to cooperate with mediators over implementing the principles of the plan "that are consistent with the demands of our people and resistance."
