UN Security Council Demands Immediate Gaza Ceasefire amid Israeli Airstrikes

A smoke plume erupts during Israeli bombardment on a building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on March 24, 2024. (Photo by Eyad BABA / AFP)
A smoke plume erupts during Israeli bombardment on a building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on March 24, 2024. (Photo by Eyad BABA / AFP)
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UN Security Council Demands Immediate Gaza Ceasefire amid Israeli Airstrikes

A smoke plume erupts during Israeli bombardment on a building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on March 24, 2024. (Photo by Eyad BABA / AFP)
A smoke plume erupts during Israeli bombardment on a building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on March 24, 2024. (Photo by Eyad BABA / AFP)

The United Nations Security Council demanded an immediate ceasefire between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas on Monday as Israeli forces carried out new airstrikes in Gaza and laid siege to two hospitals.

After vetoing three earlier draft council resolutions on the war in the Gaza Strip, Israel's main ally, the United States, abstained in the vote following global pressure for a ceasefire to ease fears of famine after nearly six months of war.

Hamas welcomed the resolution, which also demanded the unconditional release of all hostages seized by the group in its deadly Oct. 7 raid on southern Israel.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Israel could not stop its war on Hamas while there were still hostages in Gaza.

"We will operate against Hamas everywhere - including in places where we have not yet been," his ministry quoted him as saying ahead of talks in the US. "We have no moral right to stop the war while there are still hostages held in Gaza."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose relationship with Washington has been strained by the ferocity of the offensive, said the US failure to veto the proposal was a "clear retreat" from its previous position.

He said he would not now follow through on plans to send a delegation to Washington to discuss a planned Israeli military operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah. The White House said Netanyahu's decision was "disappointing".

The other 14 council members voted for the resolution demanding a ceasefire for the rest of the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan, which ends in two weeks.

"The Palestinian people have suffered greatly. This bloodbath has continued for far too long. It is our obligation to put an end to this bloodbath, before it is too late," Algeria's UN Ambassador Amar Bendjama told the Security Council after the vote.

There has been one truce to date, lasting a week at the end of November.

At least 32,333 Palestinians have been killed and 74,694 injured in Israel's offensive, including 107 Palestinians killed in the past 24 hours, the Gaza health ministry said on Monday.

Israel said 1,200 people were killed and 253 abducted in the Hamas-led raid on Oct. 7.

Airstrikes and sieges

The Security Council resolution was approved as Israel continued to besiege two Gaza hospitals where it says Hamas cells are hiding and following a new wave of Israeli airstrikes.

Rafah, the last refuge for about half of Gaza's 2.3 million population following the arrival of many people displaced by fighting elsewhere, came under heavy fire in the latest Israeli attacks, witnesses said.

Palestinian medics said 30 people had been killed in the previous 24 hours in Rafah, where Israel is planning a ground assault to eliminate what it says are militant cells there.

"The past 24 hours were one of the worst days since we moved into Rafah," said Abu Khaled, a father of seven, who declined to give his full name for fear of reprisals.

Gaza medics said an Israeli airstrike had killed 18 Palestinians in one house in Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza, and the victims were buried on Monday.

Israeli forces were also besieging Al-Amal and Nasser hospitals in the southern city of Khan Younis on Monday, Palestinian witnesses said, a week after entering Al Shifa hospital in Gaza City, the main hospital in the Strip.

Israel says hospitals in Gaza are used by Hamas as bases. Hamas and medical staff deny this.

The Israeli military said it had detained 500 people affiliated with Hamas and the allied "Islamic Jihad" and located weapons in the Al Shifa area. Israeli forces also said 20 militants had been "eliminated" in fighting and airstrikes around Al Amal Hospital over the previous 24 hours.

Reuters has been unable to access Gaza's contested hospital areas and verify accounts by either side.

Ceasefire efforts

US-backed mediation by Qatar and Egypt has so far failed to secure agreement on a ceasefire and prisoner-hostage swap between Israel and Hamas.

As these efforts have stalled, international concern has mounted about the lack of aid reaching civilians in Gaza.

Concerns grew again on Monday after the Israeli government said it would stop working in Gaza with the UN Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA, which it said was perpetuating conflict.

"UNRWA are part of the problem, and we will now stop working with them. We are actively phasing out the use of UNRWA because they perpetuate the conflict rather than try and alleviate the conflict," spokesperson David Mencer told reporters.

He made his comments after UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini said Israel had informed the UN that it will no longer approve UNRWA food convoys to the north of Gaza.

Expressing his alarm about the humanitarian situation, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres told reporters while visiting Jordan: "It is absolutely essential to have a massive supply of humanitarian aid now."

Israel denies blocking aid to Gaza, and says delivery of aid once inside the territory is the responsibility of the UN and humanitarian agencies. Israel has also accused Hamas of stealing aid, a charge the group denies.

Aid organizations say security checks and the difficulty of moving through a war zone have hindered their operations in Gaza. 



Aid to Gaza 'Facing Total Collapse', Warn 12 NGOs

 A Palestinian boy looks through a hole in the wall into a damaged room after an Israeli strike on a school housing displaced Palestinians in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on April 17, 2025. (AFP)
A Palestinian boy looks through a hole in the wall into a damaged room after an Israeli strike on a school housing displaced Palestinians in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on April 17, 2025. (AFP)
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Aid to Gaza 'Facing Total Collapse', Warn 12 NGOs

 A Palestinian boy looks through a hole in the wall into a damaged room after an Israeli strike on a school housing displaced Palestinians in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on April 17, 2025. (AFP)
A Palestinian boy looks through a hole in the wall into a damaged room after an Israeli strike on a school housing displaced Palestinians in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on April 17, 2025. (AFP)

The humanitarian aid system in Gaza is "facing total collapse" because of Israel's blockade on aid supplies since March 2, the heads of 12 major aid organizations warned Thursday, urging Israel to let them "do our jobs".

Israel has vowed to maintain its blockage on humanitarian aid to the war-ravaged territory, saying it is the only way to force Hamas to release the 58 hostages still held there.

"Every single person in Gaza is relying on humanitarian aid to survive," the chief executives of 12 NGOs, including Oxfam and Save the Children, wrote in a joint statement.

"That lifeline has been completely cut off since a blockade on all aid supplies was imposed by Israeli authorities on March 2," they said, adding that "This is one of the worst humanitarian failures of our generation."

A survey of 43 international and Palestinian aid organizations working in Gaza found that almost all have suspended or drastically cut services since a ceasefire ended on March 18, "with widespread and indiscriminate bombing making it extremely dangerous to move around", the NGOs said.

"Famine is not just a risk, but likely rapidly unfolding in almost all parts of Gaza," they said. "Survival itself is now slipping out of reach and the humanitarian system is at breaking point."

"We call on all parties to guarantee the safety of our staff and to allow the safe, unfettered access of aid into and across Gaza through all entry points, and for world leaders to oppose further restrictions."

Israel's renewed assault has killed at least 1,691 people in Gaza, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory, bringing the overall toll since the war erupted to 51,065, most of them civilians.

Hamas's October 2023 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, also mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.