Arab states condemned the U.S. for vetoing another UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.
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During an emergency session of the UN Security Council held in New York on Tuesday, the draft resolution put forward on behalf of Arab states by Algeria won 13 votes in favor among the 15 members of the Security Council. The United States voted against it, while Britain abstained.
The Palestinian presidency said in a statement carried by Palestine's official news agency WAFA that the U.S. veto "defies the will of the international community, will give an additional green light to Israel to continue its aggression against our people in the Gaza Strip, and to carry out its bloody attack on Rafah."
For his part, the Secretary-General of the Arab League (AL) Ahmed Aboul Gheit voiced his deep regret over the U.S. move, being the third time since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas conflict in October last year that the U.S. interfered to fail a draft resolution aimed to reach a ceasefire. The U.S. positions undermined the credibility of the international system and contributed to the paralysis witnessed by the United Nations, Aboul Gheit noted.
Egypt and Qatar, having been actively brokering deals between Israel and Hamas since their conflict began, have expressed their regret. Egypt strongly denounced the "selectivity and double standards in dealing with wars and armed conflicts in various regions of the world," the Egyptian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Tuesday.
In a statement released on Wednesday, the Syrian Foreign Ministry slammed the U.S. veto as "arbitrary and disgraceful." Damasco accused the U.S. of being hypocritical, as it claimed to support human rights while allowing the Israeli killing machine to continue its attacks on Palestinian civilians.
Jordan, which borders Israel and has normalized ties with Israel, expressed on Tuesday its regret and disappointment at the failure of the UN Security Council to adopt a resolution on a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.
Algeria's Permanent Representative to the United Nations Amar Bendjama also expressed its rejection, "All those impeding such calls should review their policies and calculations because wrong decisions today will have a cost on our region and our world tomorrow. This cost will be violence and instability," he was quoted by the UN news as saying.
The resolution was put forward at a time when Israel has signaled its intention to conduct a ground operation in Rafah, Gaza's southernmost city that shelters about 1.4 million Palestinians.
On Monday, countries in the region, including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Bahrain, expressed deep concern over the possible offensive.
Twenty-six EU member states called for an "immediate humanitarian pause that would lead to a sustainable ceasefire" in the besieged Gaza Strip, the bloc's foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said in Brussels on Monday.