US officials are set to face another showdown at the United Nations Security Council later this week as the United Arab Emirates, the sole Arab nation in the current rotation of the 15-strong organ, is expected to propose a renewed resolution for a ceasefire in Gaza.
The UAE said it would file the resolution after UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres took the rare action of invoking Article 99 of the UN Charter, which notified the security council that the crisis in the Palestinian strip represented a threat to world peace.
It was the first time Guterres invoked the article since heading the UN in 2017. Several UN agencies have also given their support for Guterres's call for a renewed ceasefire.
In response, Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen retorted that Guterres allegedly supported Hamas and that his tenure as UN boss was a "danger to world peace."
"Anyone who supports world peace must support the liberation of Gaza from Hamas," he added.
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Washington: Calls for Ceasefire Allows Hamas to Dig In
The Guardian reported that deputy US Ambassador to the UN Robert Wood said that the Biden administration did not support the Gaza issue being brought to the security council at this point of the war.
"We remain focused on the difficult and sensitive diplomacy geared to getting more hostages released, more aid flowing into Gaza and better protection of civilians," he told Reuters.
It was also revealed that the renewed call for a permanent ceasefire would be vetoed by the US in the event it would be proposed. While the diplomatic price the US would have to pay by vetoing it would be high, Washington believed that a ceasefire would only leave Hamas entrenched in Gaza.
US diplomats insisted that they instead supported pauses in the fighting to facilitate the release of Israeli hostages, like the seven-day truce brokered by Qatar last week.
Wood's stance would also risk putting him at odds with the EU's top diplomat, Josep Borrell, who issued a statement supporting Guterres's call.
Borrell said that the UN must "act immediately to prevent a full collapse of the humanitarian situation."
US diplomats in the UN have already used its veto once in the duration of the Israel-Hamas war after a resolution calling for a humanitarian ceasefire, citing that the proposed draft did not explicitly criticize Hamas.
