The US vetoes a supported UN resolution demanding an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, while ICJ hearings continue.
Here’s how things stand on Wednesday, February 21, 2024:
Fighting and humanitarian crisis
- Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, said the Israeli military has bombed a shelter hosting MSF staff in al-Mawasi near Khan Younis in southern Gaza.
- In the 24 hours between Monday and Tuesday afternoon, 103 Palestinians were reported killed and 142 injured by Israeli attacks on Gaza, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
- The World Food Programme said it has paused deliveries of food to isolated northern Gaza because of attacks and the breakdown of civil order in the region. The weakening of the aid operations threatens to deepen misery across the territory, where Israel’s air and ground offensive has killed over 29,000 Palestinians.
Regional tensions and Diplomacy
- The US vetoed an Arab-backed and widely supported UN resolution demanding an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza.
- Before the vote, Algeria’s UN Ambassador Amar Bendjama said: “A vote in favour of this draft resolution is a support to the Palestinians’ right to life. Conversely, voting against it implies an endorsement of the brutal violence and collective punishment inflicted against them.”
- China’s Ambassador to the UN Zhang Jun said that the US’s veto “stifles” an “overwhelming consensus” among the UNSC’s members on a ceasefire in Gaza.
- Separately, South Africa argued at the United Nations’ top court that Israel is responsible for apartheid against the Palestinians and that Israel’s occupation of land sought for a Palestinian state is “inherently and fundamentally illegal”. Israel rejects such claims.
- The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has described Israeli soldiers’ reported looting of homes in Gaza as a “symptom of genocide and ethnic cleansing”.
- And in Yemen, the Houthi rebels claimed they struck an Israeli cargo ship, the MSC Silver, in the Gulf of Aden near the entrance to the Red Sea with a number of missiles.
At today’s session, Amb. Dr. Riyad Mansour condemned the Security Council’s failure to call for a #ceasefire in #Gaza “By the time this session ends, over 25 #Palestinians will be dead due to the Council’s inaction, It means more babies will be murdered.” @AlgeriaUN @UN #UNSC pic.twitter.com/J9d0LT3bvs
— State of Palestine (@Palestine_UN) February 21, 2024
Violence in the occupied West Bank
- Israeli forces destroyed infrastructure and fired live rounds in Jenin, as raids on dozens of homes continue in the city in the occupied West Bank, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa.
- The Israeli military said it had targeted a “terrorist cell” with an air strike in Jenin, killing three people. Palestinian armed groups said they had responded by using explosive devices against Israeli military vehicles.
- Israeli forces also arrested a minor in the town of al-Khader, south of Bethlehem.