Gaza: the UN Security Council meets urgently on Wednesday

Strong tensions which worry the international community. At the request of Russia and the United Arab Emirates, the UN Security Council will hold an emergency meeting on Wednesday October 18 after a deadly shooting at a hospital in Gaza and will decide just before on a resolution carried by Brazil to try to find a common position on the war between Israel and Hamas.

“Russia and the United Arab Emirates have requested holding an urgent public meeting of the United Nations Security Council on the morning of October 18 due to the strike on a hospital in Gaza,” Russian Deputy Ambassador to the UN, Dmitri Polianskii, said on Telegram. This meeting will take place on Wednesday at 2 p.m. GMT (4 p.m. in Paris) , according to the UN.

As US President Joe Biden left for Israel on Tuesday evening, diplomatic sources at the UN indicated that a resolution presented by Brazil, president of the Security Council in October, would be submitted to the votes of 15 Emember states of the Council just before this meeting.

A resolution proposed by Russia rejected on Monday

In full diplomatic activity on the war between Israel and Hamas, the Security Council rejected Monday evening a resolution proposed by Russia to a “humanitarian ceasefire” and was supposed to decide immediately on a second text presented by Brazil. Diplomats had mentioned the date of this Tuesday for the Council to adopt or not the Brazilian text.

The Russian resolution rejected Monday called for an “immediate, lasting and fully respected humanitarian ceasefire” and “unhindered” humanitarian access to the Gaza Strip under siege. But without naming the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, which was unacceptable for the United States, the United Kingdom and France.

Brazil’s draft resolution specifically condemns “the heinous Hamas terrorist attacks”.