The US on Friday vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution that would have called for a ceasefire in Gaza, rebuffing last-ditch efforts from Arab leaders as alarm grows about Israel’s military campaign. 

The US cleared the potential sale of almost 14,000 tank rounds to Israel, citing an emergency that allows for a fast-track notification to legislators as foreign military aid remains stalled in Congress. 

Netanyahu and Putin in lengthy discussion on war

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke at length on Sunday with Russian President Vladimir Putin about Israel’s war against Hamas and the situation in the region, the prime minister’s office said. 

In the 50-minute call, Netanyahu strongly criticised what he termed “dangerous cooperation” between Russia and Iran, according to the readout. He also expressed displeasure with the positions put forward by Russian representatives at the UN and other forums against Israel.  

“The prime minister emphasised that any country that would suffer an attack such as Israel experienced would act with no less force than the one with which Israel operates,” his office said. 

The Kremlin hasn’t released a readout of the conversation. 

Hamas killed some 1,200 people in Israel in its attack on 7 October, including babies, children and the elderly, and kidnapped about 240 back to Gaza. Some of those taken hostage have since been released in an exchange deal with Palestinian prisoners held in Israel.  

Netanyahu requested that Russia put pressure on the Red Cross to visit and provide medicine for the estimated 137 hostages still held by Hamas. No humanitarian organisation has visited them since they were taken. 

US vetoes Security Council demand for ceasefire in Gaza

The US on Friday vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution that would have called for a ceasefire in Gaza, rebuffing last-ditch efforts from Arab leaders as alarm grows about Israel’s military campaign.

The US was the only nation on the 15-member council to vote against the resolution, which it criticised for not condemning the 7 October attacks by Hamas, including sexual violence, and said wouldn’t lead to peace. The UK abstained and 13 nations voted in favour.

“Unfortunately, nearly all our recommendations were ignored and the result of this rushed process was an unbalanced resolution that was divorced from reality,” said Robert Wood, US deputy ambassador to the UN. 

The resolution was introduced by the United Arab Emirates after UN Secretary-General António Guterres urged the Security Council to act. The proposal had nearly 100 cosponsors, a stark indication of how opposition is growing to Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. 

The Biden administration has also expressed reservations about the high civilian death toll but argues Israel must have the right to defend itself against Hamas, which is labelled a terrorist organisation by the US and the European Union. 

Vetoing the resolution offers crucial support to Israel, in keeping with President Joe Biden’s argument that the close US ally must not have to tolerate the threat of Hamas. But it also alienates many allies overseas and progressive Democrats at home.  

The UAE and other backers of the resolution argued that Israel’s response — which Hamas-run health authorities said had killed more than 17,000 people — has been too indiscriminate and provoked a humanitarian crisis for Palestinians who remain in Gaza. 

In the meantime, Israel pressed on with its offensive throughout Gaza on Friday and Hamas targeted Israel with rockets. Israeli troops pushed deeper into the southern city of Khan Younis, the hometown of Hamas’ leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar. 

Biden administration expedites US tank munitions for Israel 

The US cleared the potential sale of almost 14,000 tank rounds to Israel, citing an emergency that allows for a fast-track notification to legislators as foreign military aid remains stalled in Congress.

Israel has requested to buy the 120mm munitions for an estimated cost of $106.5-million, the Pentagon’s Defense Security Cooperation Agency said on Saturday.

The proposed sale allows the US to arm an ally while congressional Republicans demand tougher border security in negotiations to unlock aid to countries, including Ukraine and Israel, and fund the federal government.

The Biden administration “provided detailed justification to Congress that an emergency exists that requires the immediate sale” to Israel, waiving congressional review requirements for arms exports, according to the statement.  

University leaders resign over anti-Semitism on campus row

University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill and board chair Scott Bok resigned after coming under intense pressure from alumni, donors and lawmakers amid an escalating row over anti-Semitism on campus.

Magill’s departure was announced in a statement by Bok on Saturday. He then issued his own message emphasising that Magill is not the “slightest bit anti-Semitic” and making clear that she was exhausted by relentless external attacks when she testified before Congress on 5 December in a widely criticised performance.

“Former President Liz Magill last week made a very unfortunate misstep — consistent with that of two peer university leaders sitting alongside her — after five hours of aggressive questioning before a Congressional committee,” Bok wrote. “It became clear that her position was no longer tenable, and she and I concurrently decided that it was time for her to exit.”

Magill (58) will stay on until an interim president of the Philadelphia-based school is appointed, but Bok, also the chief executive officer of investment bank Greenhill & Co., will depart immediately. 

Julie Platt, vice chair of the Penn board and board chair of the Jewish Federations of North America, will serve as interim chair until a successor is appointed. 

The resignations are the highest-profile response so far to a burgeoning crisis facing US academic leaders in the aftermath of the 7 October attack on Israel by Hamas. Magill and Bok have faced calls for weeks to step down, led by Apollo Management Group’s Marc Rowan, who’s also head of the board of Penn’s Wharton business school, but the demands soared following the hearing. 

Harvard University’s Claudine Gay and Massachusetts Institute of Technology President Sally Kornbluth have also been excoriated by politicians, business leaders and alumni since they testified alongside Magill before the US House Education and the Workforce Committee on Tuesday. 

The three spent hours stressing the need to balance freedom of speech while providing a safe environment for students, but failed to say outright that calling for the genocide of Jews is against school policy. Instead they offered narrow legal responses that quickly went viral on social media.

Magill later released a video to clarify her remarks, saying she should have been focused on the “irrefutable fact”’ that such a call is “some of the most terrible violence human beings can perpetrate”. 

“Worn down by months of relentless external attacks, she was not herself last Tuesday,” Bok wrote. “Over-prepared and over-lawyered given the hostile forum and high stakes, she provided a legalistic answer to a moral question, and that was wrong. It made for a dreadful 30-second sound bite in what was more than five hours of testimony.” DM

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