The United States announced on Sunday that it requested a vote at the UN Security Council on its three-stage ceasefire proposal for Gaza.
Nate Evans, spokesperson for the US mission to the UN, confirmed that the request had been submitted to the Security Council.
The proposal, previously announced by President Joe Biden and prepared by Israel, outlines several key steps.
“As we have repeatedly emphasized, implementation of this deal would enable an immediate cease-fire, the release of hostages, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from populated areas in its first phase, an immediate surge in humanitarian assistance and restoration of basic services, and the return of Palestinian civilians to northern Gaza, together with a roadmap for ending the crisis altogether and a multi-year internationally backed reconstruction plan,” Evans stated, according to the Anadolu news agency.
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Evans claimed that “Israel has accepted this proposal”, adding that the Security Council “has the chance to unite and call on Hamas to do the same.”
UN sources suggested that the vote could be scheduled on the Security Council’s agenda at the beginning of the week.
Has Israel Accepted the Proposal?
Israel, however, has not officially accepted the proposal, with some Israeli officials urging an expansion of the war.
On June 5, Israeli ministers Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich called to expand the war and invade southern Lebanon.
Israel will only win after it “enters all of Gaza and fights until victory,” Ben-Gvir said, according to The Times of Israel.
In a report on Saturday, the Washington Post said that “despite Biden’s personal and very public urging, his dispatch of senior administration officials to the region, the drafting of a new United Nations Security Council resolution and the marshaling of allies to join in a chorus of approval, neither Israel nor Hamas appear to have budged on their wide divergence over the proposed road map to permanently end the war in Gaza.”
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“In Israel, while relatives of some of the rescued hostages urged Netanyahu to seize the moment to make a deal that envisioned the return of around 100 remaining Hamas captives, a jubilant prime minister made no reference to the proposal” in an address to the Israeli army, according to the report.
“You once again proved that Israel does not surrender to terrorism. … We are obligated to do the same in the future,” the Israeli Prime Minister said, referring to the military operation that rescued four Israeli captives and killed over 270 Palestinians, wounding nearly 800 more.
Ongoing Genocide
Currently on trial before the International Court of Justice for genocide against Palestinians, Israel has been waging a devastating war on Gaza since October 7.
According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 37,124 Palestinians have been killed, and 84,712 wounded in Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza starting on October 7.
Moreover, at least 7,000 people are unaccounted for, presumed dead under the rubble of their homes throughout the Strip.
Palestinian and international organizations say that the majority of those killed and wounded are women and children.
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The Israeli war has resulted in an acute famine, mostly in northern Gaza, resulting in the death of many Palestinians, mostly children.
The Israeli aggression has also resulted in the forceful displacement of nearly two million people from all over the Gaza Strip, with the vast majority of the displaced forced into the densely crowded southern city of Rafah near the border with Egypt – in what has become Palestine’s largest mass exodus since the 1948 Nakba.
Israel says that 1,200 soldiers and civilians were killed during the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation on October 7. Israeli media published reports suggesting that many Israelis were killed on that day by ‘friendly fire’.
(PC, Anadolu)
