The UK on Thursday supported a US-sponsored United Nations General Assembly draft resolution condemning the Hamas group, yet the motion failed to pass, despite unprecedented support.
The draft resolution received a comfortable majority of votes, however it fell short of the two-thirds super-majority needed to pass. 87 countries voted in favour of the resolution, while 57 opposed it. 33 countries abstained and another 23 were absent.
An earlier motion specified that the vote required a two-thirds majority in order to be adopted. Twenty minutes before the vote, the General Assembly held a separate vote on the size of the majority the resolution would need to pass. The US asked that a simple majority would be required, but Kuwait asked for a two-thirds majority. The Kuwaiti request won by a slim majority of 75 in favour to 72 against.
UK Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the UN in New York, H.E. Karen Pierce said: “The people of Israel and Gaza have the right to live without constant fear for their security. Both peoples have the right to live safely in peace”.
In FCO Questions in the House of Commons this week, CFI Officer Maria Caulfield MP asked whether the UK Government will be supporting the resolution “condemning Hamas for the increasing violence and attacks on civilians and worsening situation in Gaza”. Watch the exchange here.
The resolution condemning Hamas was widely supported by European, North and South American states. Among those to vote against the measure were China and Russia, and every Muslim majority nation apart from Bosnia, while India abstained.
The motion, entitled ‘Activities of Hamas and Other Militant Groups in Gaza’, condemned Hamas “for repeatedly firing rockets into Israel and for inciting violence, thereby putting civilians at risk”. It would have been the first UN General Assembly measure to target the terror organisation.
In her introduction of the resolution, US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley had appealed on member states to leave aside their view of how an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal should look like and simply take a stand against terrorism.
The resolution would have demanded that “Hamas and other militant actors including Palestinian Islamic Jihad cease all provocative actions and violent activity, including by using airborne incendiary devices”. It also condemned Hamas’s use of sources in Gaza “construct military infrastructure, including tunnels to infiltrate Israel and equipment to launch rockets into civilian areas, when such resources could be used to address the critical needs of the civilian population”.
Responding to the outcome of the vote, Ambassador Hayley said: “The General Assembly has passed over 700 resolutions condemning Israel. And not one single resolution condemning Hamas. That, more than anything else, is a condemnation of the United Nations itself”.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu noted that it was the first time at the UN that such a large majority of countries had taken “a principled stand against Hamas”.
Yair Lapid, the leader of Israeli party Yesh Atid, said that the vote “will be remembered as a shameful low point in the history of the UN”.
In the days leading up to the vote, Hamas leaders had embarked on a rare diplomatic campaign to gather support against the resolution, with Hamas head Ismail Haniyeh appealing to Arab countries, the UN and elsewhere.
The resolution came weeks after Hamas and other Gaza terror groups fired over 460 rockets into Israel.
