On Thursday, the United States was the sole veto that struck down a United Nations (UN) resolution that would recognize Gaza as an independent state separate from Israel.
As reported by the Washington Examiner, the 15-member Security Council voted on the measure, which would recommend that the whole General Assembly, consisting of 193 members, would recognize Gaza as a state and thus grant it membership in the U.N. But in the vote, 12 nations voted in favor, while two abstained, and the U.S. alone voted against it.
“It remains the U.S. view that the most expeditious path toward statehood for the Palestinian people is through direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority with the support of the United States and other partners,” said State Department spokesman Vedant Patel in a news briefing after the vote, pointing out that a U.N. resolution would not solve the problem.
“Recent escalations make it even more important to support good-faith efforts to find lasting peace between Israel and a fully independent, viable, and sovereign Palestinian state,” said U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. “Failure to make progress toward a two-state solution will only increase volatility and risk for hundreds of millions of people across the region, who will continue to live under the constant threat of violence.”
For any resolution to pass the U.N. Security Council, nine members must vote in favor; a resolution will also be struck down if any one of the five permanent members of the Council vote against it. Aside from the U.S., the other permanent members are the United Kingdom, France, Russia, and China.
Gaza has been considered by the U.N. to be a non-member observer state, with this categorization being in use since 2012. If the resolution had passed the Security Council, it would have needed the support of two-thirds of the General Assembly.