UN Security Council votes for Gaza ceasefire plan

The United Nations Security Council on Monday adopted a US-drafted resolution supporting a ceasefire plan in Gaza, as Washington leads an intense diplomatic campaign to push Hamas to accept the proposal.

The text -- passed with 14 votes in favor and Russia abstaining -- "welcomes" the truce and hostage release proposal announced on May 31 by President Joe Biden, and urges "parties to fully implement its terms without delay and without condition."

The resolution says Israel has accepted the truce plan, and "calls upon Hamas to also accept it."

Hamas said Monday that it "welcomes" the vote.

The United States, a staunch ally of Israel, has been widely criticized for having blocked several previous UN draft resolutions calling for a ceasefire in Gaza.

But Biden late last month launched a new US effort to secure a truce and hostage release.

"Today we voted for peace," US ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said after the UN session.

"Today this Council sent a clear message to Hamas: accept the ceasefire deal on the table. Israel has already agreed to this deal and the fighting could stop today if Hamas would do the same."

However the deal remains uncertain as Hamas officials have insisted that any ceasefire agreement must guarantee a permanent end to the war -- a demand Israel has firmly rejected, vowing to destroy Hamas and free the remaining captives.

Under the proposal, Israel would withdraw from Gaza population centers and Hamas would free the hostages. The ceasefire would last an initial six weeks, with it extended as negotiators seek a permanent end to hostilities.

The "text is not perfect," said Algeria's UN Ambassador Amar Bendjama. "But it offers a glimmer of hope to the Palestinians, as the alternative is continued killing and suffering."

- Hamas silence -

After the vote, Israeli diplomat Reut Shapir Ben Naftaly emphasized that the "war will end" only when Israeli "goals are met," including the release of hostages and the destruction of Hamas.

"Hamas' refusal to release the hostages through diplomacy has proven that the effort to bring our hostages home must also include military means," she said.

The Palestinian envoy to the United Nations, Riyad Mansour, meanwhile welcomed the council's vote, stating that the "burden" of implementing the resolution and ceasefire "is on the Israeli side."

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas added that he considered "the adoption of this resolution a step in the right direction to end the war of genocide against our people in the Gaza Strip."

Since the unprecedented attack by Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas on October 7 against Israel, and the subsequent Israeli counterattack, the UN Security Council has struggled to act.

Following two resolutions focused on humanitarian aid, the Security Council finally at the end of March demanded an "immediate ceasefire" for the duration of Ramadan, after the United States abstained from the vote.

The Gaza war was sparked by Hamas's attack on southern Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,194 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.

Israel's retaliatory offensive has killed at least 37,124 people in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory's health ministry.

The first phase of the truce would see an "immediate, full and complete ceasefire," the release of hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, and the "withdrawal of Israeli forces from the populated areas in Gaza."

This would also allow the "safe and effective distribution of humanitarian assistance at scale throughout the Gaza Strip to all Palestinian civilians who need it."

Russia's UN ambassador, Vasily Nebenzia, countered that the council was singing on to the plan without "details" and "giving a carte blanche."

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken held talks in Israel with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday, the latest effort to halt the eight months of war.

4 Palestinians killed in West Bank

Israeli forces killed four Palestinians on Monday in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Authority said, one of whom the military said had started a fire at an Israeli outpost.

Hundreds of Palestinians and more than a dozen Israelis have been killed in violence across the West Bank since the outbreak of the war between Israel and the militant group Hamas in Gaza began on October 7.

Four Palestinians were killed on Monday by Israeli "occupation fire" in the town of Kfar Naima, north-west of Ramallah, the territory's health ministry said.

A general strike was called in Ramallah by Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas in response to the killings, along with a pre-planned rally for Palestinians jailed by Israel.

The Israeli military said it shot at a group of four people who attempted to flee in a vehicle and tried to "run over forces" when Israeli police went to Kfar Naima to arrest a suspect. One Israeli officer was lightly hurt, an army statement said.

One of those killed was accused of setting fire to a caravan in a nearby settler outpost, Sde Ephraim Farm.

Israel has occupied the West Bank since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and hundreds of thousands of settlers have since moved to the Palestinian territory, in breach of international law.

An Israeli police statement said a gun and explosive devices were found when officers searched the vehicle in Kfar Naima.

At least 524 Palestinians have been killed across the West Bank by Israeli forces or settlers, Palestinian officials say.

Over the same period at least 14 Israelis have been killed in the territory, according to an AFP toll based on Israeli figures.