New York [US] : Israel on Friday slammed a United Nations resolution urging a "humanitarian truce" in Gaza and added that it is a "dark day for the UN and mankind. Israel will continue to defend itself and use every means at its disposal to accomplish this mission, said Gilad Erdan, Israel's Permanent Representative to the United Nations.
In his remarks at the United Nations General Assembly Emergency Special Session on the Israel-Hamas war, Gilad Erdan said, "The truth holds zero importance in this body. Today, the majority of the community has shown that it prefers to support the defence of Nazi terrorists rather than support the law-abiding state of Israel to defend its civilians. Anyone who is truly interested in preventing violence shouldn't vote for resolutions protecting terrorists."
"Whoever truly wants to prevent more violence should be calling on Hamas to lay down their arms, turn themselves in, and return all hostages. If this were to happen, the war would end immediately. This is a dark day for the UN and for mankind," he said. Speaking about Israel's counter-offensive against Hamas, Erdan said, "Israel will continue to defend itself. We will defend our future, our very existence, by reading the words of Hamas's, evil, so that it can never threaten anyone else again. Israel will use every means at our disposal to accomplish this mission. Israel will do what must be done to eradicate Hamas's capabilities and bring the hostages home and we will bring them home."
He made the remarks as the United Nations General Assembly on Friday (local time) adopted a resolution calling for an "immediate, durable and sustained humanitarian truce" between Israeli forces and Hamas terrorists in Gaza. The resolution made no specific mention of the Hamas terror attacks of 7 October.
The Jordanian-led draft resolution was adopted by the General Assembly, with 120 votes in favour, 14 against and 45 abstentions. The 45 nations that abstained from voting on the resolution included Iceland, India, Panama, Lithuania and Greece.
Criticising the UN for adopting the resolution, Erdan said, "We have all witnessed that the UN no longer holds even one ounce of legitimacy or relevance. This organization was founded in the wake of the Holocaust for the purpose of preventing atrocities. Yet the spectacle we just saw proves beyond a doubt that the UN is committed sadly tragically, not to preventing but ensuring further atrocities."
He stressed that Israel endured the "largest massacre of Jews" since the Holocaust. However, Israel has no right to defend itself as per the majority of the "so-called" family of nations." He said that the resolution adopted at the UNGA did not mention Hamas. "Israel has the right to defend itself and the realization of this right is to ensure that such atrocities are never repeated. The only way to ensure this is the eradication of Hamas's terror capabilities. The only way. Yet this resolution does not even name Hamas. As if this war started on its own. Not once, even when discussing our hostages, the drafters could not even bring themselves to name the Hamas terrorists responsible for this blatant war crime, not even once," Gilad Erdan said.
He further said, "It is the duty of this body to call out murderous terrorists by name, not hide them behind empty words. Why are you defending murderers? Why are you defending terrorists who deliberately beheaded children and abducted babies? What is going on here? This must make each of you ask yourselves what the true aim was when this resolution was submitted. Was it to bring about a solution or was it to tie Israel's hands from defending itself?"
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He asserted that Israel's goal is to eradicate Hamas's capabilities to prevent future atrocities. He further said, "We all know that if given the chance, Hamas and Hezbollah would commit the October 7 massacre again and again and again, until there is not a single Israeli left to murder or a single citizen to terrorize and drive away from Israel. And the only way to destroy Hamas is to root them out of their tunnels and their subterranean city of terror."
He accused Hamas of operating its main base in Gaza's Shifa Hospital and using people as human shields. He questioned the international community for not holding Hamas accountable. He said that the goal of the resolution is that Israel should not defend itself against Hamas. He said, "Hamas has embedded itself deep within and under the Gazan civilian population. Just today, Israel's intelligence unequivocally proved that Hamas's main operating base is located inside and underneath Shifa Hospital in Gaza, home to thousands of patients and medical staff. The people of Gaza are being exploited as human shields for terrorists. Why? Why are you not holding Hamas accountable?"
"17 years of Hamas's indiscriminate rocket fire on our civilians from within populated areas is not enough for you to comprehend this. Yet this dangerous resolution demands that Israel call for Gazans to return to this active war zone. Is the goal here to further endanger human lives? This ridiculous resolution has the audacity to call for a truth. The goal of this resolution's truth is that Israel should cease to defend itself from Hamas so Hamas can light us on fire," he added.
