UN workers try to help an injured man who was shot while returning from the south to the north of the Gaza Strip along the Salah Al Din road, central Gaza Strip, 25 November 2023 (reissued 05 April 2024). On 07 October 2023, Hamas militants launched an attack against Israel from the Gaza Strip. Six months later, and after more than 33,000 Palestinians and over 1,450 Israelis have been killed, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF); the conflict continues with what the UN agencies described as a catastrophic humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip and high political tensions in Israel. The UN Security Council passed a resolution on 25 March demanding an 'immediate ceasefire' in Gaza for the duration of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. But with Ramadan soon over, both Gazans and relatives of Israelis taken hostage in the October attacks are unsure when this latest flare-up of a long term conflict will really end. EPA-EFE/MOHAMMED SABER Twenty-eight countries voted in favour, 13 abstained and six opposed the resolution, including the United States and Germany. The adoption prompted several representatives to the Council to cheer and clap.
The resolution stressed "the need to ensure accountability for all violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law in order to end impunity".
It also expressed "grave concern at reports of serious human rights violations and grave breaches of international humanitarian law, including of possible war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Occupied Palestinian Territory".
Meirav Eilon Shahar, Israel's permanent representative to the United Nations in Geneva, accused the Council of having "long abandoned the Israeli people and long defended Hamas".
"According to the resolution before you today, Israel has no right to protect its people, while Hamas has every right to murder and torture innocent Israelis," she said ahead of the vote. "A vote 'Yes' is a vote for Hamas."
The United States had pledged to vote against the resolution because it did not contain a specific condemnation of Hamas for the Oct. 7 attacks, nor "any reference to the terrorist nature of those actions".
It did, however, said that its ally Israel had not done enough to mitigate harm to civilians.
"The United States has repeatedly urged Israel to de-conflict military operations against Hamas with humanitarian operations, in order to avoid civilian casualties and to ensure humanitarian actors can carry out their essential mission in safety," said Michèle Taylor, U.S. permanent representative to the Council.
"That has not happened and, in just six months, more humanitarians have been killed in this conflict than in any war of the modern era."
The U.N. Human Rights Council, which meets several times a year, is the only intergovernmental body designed to protect human rights worldwide. It can increase scrutiny of countries' human rights records and authorise investigations.
(Reporting by Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber; Editing by Matthias Williams and Kevin Liffey)