The United Nations General Assembly voted 124-14 on Wednesday to strip Israel of the right to self-defense in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem.
The test of the resolution was based on the International Court of Justice’s advisory opinion in July that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory was illegal.
The resolution also calls on member states not to sell arms or military equipment to Israel that would be used in Gaza, the West Bank, and east Jerusalem.
Among the 43 countries that abstained were Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom. Some 12 of the 27 European Union countries abstained, including Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Lithuania, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Sweden.
The headline is genocide apologia and should be banned.
The entire article is utter apologetic trash, doing its absolute best to show how unpopular this decision is (despite being hugely popular) and focusing on “Hamas terrorism concerns” without any consideration at all given to Palestinians.
That is a very misleading headline. Carpet bombing over 30.000 civilians to death is not self defense, not even close to it.
Israel and Kyle Rittenhouse can agree on one thing, it’s totally cool to kill people and then pretend you were defending yourself
Please yankee, don’t make everything happening in the world about you
I’m not trying to make it about me, I’m trying to say that what Israel was doing was not self-defense
Germany abstaining is actually a big deal.
The defense of Israel is one of our “Reason of State” and not voting in favour of Israel is a serious signal that politicians are fed up with Netanyahus bullshit.
Germany often abstained in critical UN votes regarding Israel and Palestine. E.g. here or here.
And german “intellectuals” are already in the “it is not binding” mode… Germanies political and media class is lost, completly detached from the constituency, who is against the genocide by a large margin.
Looks like israel doesn’t have the right to defend itself.
There’s a difference between defending oneself and engaging in collective punishment and genocide. I am Jewish and the descendent of holocaust survivors. Not in my name.
I mean yes, but this ruling is fhat they can’t do either. Since these regions are illegally occupied, their inhabitants have the right to resist said occupation and, therefore Israel doesn’t have the right to defend itself in the same way it would against an independent country.
You’re awesome - have a great day. Thank you.
in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem.
Yup. Israel is treating them like land that’s free to colonize, when in reality a nation (albeit one with unstable government, and only recently UN-recognized) lives there.
Similarly, Japan can’t claim it’s “defending itself” if it hypothetically performs violent acts in Lebanon.
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Given that its ‘defence’ is indiscriminately bombing civilian populations and blowing the limbs off children, they shouldn’t be allowed to. Israel shouldn’t have committed war crimes similar to the Nazis.
Israel has been murdering Palestinians for decades now. It’s a country founded on mass murder and genocide.
It’s a country founded on 19th century White Colonialist ideology (this bunch of people who see themselves as Whites being Jewish rather than Christian makes no different to their victims) which, unlike the places from were such thinking hailed, has never evolved away from it, quite the contrary: just like Apartheid South Africa, with time they just become more violent and oppressive against those they see as lesser races, only Apartheid South Africa was forced to stop whilst Israel just kept doubling down on it and getting more violent.
It’s not by chance that most Israelis and their leadership say that they “have Western Values”: they do have Western Values it’s just that they’re 19th century Western Values.
“Rights” can only be taken away by force, if there is no method to ensure compliance, this is yet another meaningless resolution.
The UN is a diplomatic organization. It is a forum to discuss things and literally has no actual means to enforce anything. Its goal is not enforcement, it’s to discuss.
What is the point of voting, especially veto, if it’s all just voicing complaints?
If you hear 5 people yell at 5 people then they take a vote and the vote comes out 101 to 5 and the rest staying silent (hypothetical), it’s different than 53-53. It helps you understand what others believe/support while not having to listen to all of them talk.
And prevent such global wars like WWII. Funnily enough, the state of Israel was funded exactly by an UN resolution, and now Israel is trying to discredit the same institution that’s responsible for the existence of their state.
Exactly. Every time the UN does something, people say “they can’t enforce it”.
Well, that’s the whole point of the UN. To resolve things without using force.
It’s a good design, designed by people who learned from the horrors of WW2.
It’s sad to see how many people nowadays forget those lessons and are itching for global war.
You got it ass-backwards. The point of the UN as opposed to LoN was that it can enforce shit. And do that very heavily. The only problem was that the chosen group of wise and powerful to decide this now includes Russia as the heir of the USSR (why the hell) and China (which is not the China that got the place initially) and UK (which is collecting cannibals to suck off all over the globe) and USA (which just arbitrarily invaded Iraq and didn’t even apologize) and France (seems kinda normal, but CFA etc were not nice) and the situation really sucks.
Russia and the US are involved because the other half of the UNs purpose is to keep them both from nuking shit.
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Because there is value in a large group speaking with a unified voice to say “this is wrong, and you need to know that the rest of us think it’s wrong. Your behavior will affect the relationship you have with us all going forward”. Direct intervention isn’t the only form of consequence.
Is it the best solution to the problem? No. Is it still worth doing? Yes.
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I, personally, am itching for progress. In my lifetime. What history has proven is that progress is never achieved without bloodshed.
Though there is one very easy step the US at least can take that isn’t bloodshed: STOP SELLING WEAPONS TO ISRAEL.
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So about as useful as us here as far as getting anything to actually happen :(
When it comes to Israel, they have very little incentive in changing their ways when the US refuses to join the rest of the world in condemning them.
Still, there are 124 countries that made it clear that they think what Israel is doing is wrong.
It stopped being about self-defense, if anyone ever bothered trailing what Israel had been doing.
But, go watch the prime minister declare everyone anti-semantic anyways over this.
It was never about self defence.
Ever since 1948, Israel has been systematically killing everyone in their ‘promised land’.
Honestly it would be an open and shut case here in the US.
My neighbor throws grenades into my window, me running into their house with my friends and shooting everyone there who looks like they might have had a grenade is not self-defense…
More like, im occupying my neighbor house while having him locked on the basement, he throws a rock at me and I’m just go around killing everyone I see.
Weird that the comments and the top level post are calling out the countries which abstained but apperently no one cares about the ‘against’ votes.
I think it may be due to the “against” votes coming from the obvious places (Israel, USA) and a bunch of tiny places most people couldn’t point in a map.
The “curious” ones for me are Panama and Argentina. Curious as in I wonder what their statements to vote against would be
Argentina is an obvious one. Milei is a giant US bootlicker.
Is this just symbolic? Does it levy any penalties for not complying?
The resolution has declaratory power only but provides international backing to those countries that want to take additional steps against Israel.
Ashamed that my country abstained here
I’m not.
They voted in favour?
It’s obvious why OP is ashamed. But why aren’t you? Proud of your nation’s quiet support of a genocide?
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So you’re saying you condemn the rapist soldiers at Sde Teiman, the mob that rioted in their defense, and the administration that fostered an environment where that would happen?
Because surely you aren’t refering to the fabricated hoax about Hamas doing mass rape. You’ll reject it out of hand, but I guess for anyone else reading this, another good breakdown.
so you agree, Palestine has a right to defend itself, including with armed resistance? or is this a case of “FAFO for me, but not for thee”?
Nope it definitely goes both ways, but one side has everything to lose. I might be morally justified trying to take on ms13 but I’m still going to get my ass handed to me.
one side DOES have everything to lose, and it’s the side being ethnically cleansed, starved, kidnapped, bombed, mauled by dogs, indiscriminately shot, and thrown into rape camps for about 75 years now. I’m glad you agree Palestinians have a right to resist their own eradication 🫡
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And nobody will obey that decision.
ICJ has made some rulings about Artsakh too. Should have been not so hard to sanction the beheading savages out of occupying a small country and expelling its residents. By the way, in the UN charter a “country” does not only refer to UN members, that distinction is intentionally made clear in a few places.
UN is less useful than Holy Roman Empire.
It’s not a decision to obey. It’s just a boring skit they put on once in a while. I feel like the kids’ Model UN has more actual impact on society than the UN and its toothless performative bullshit
Legislative bodies get their “teeth” by the state monopoly on violence. The UN having teeth would have to mean UN forces, and it’d even have to mean those forces being among the strongest in the world.
It’s a diplomatic tool, not anything else. It encourages communication and collaboration and discourages conflict.
Why list a select 15 abstainers in the summary rather than the 14 voting against? Besides the obvious ones (Israel, US, Czechia), there’s Hungary, Argentina, Paraguay, Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Palau, Nauru, Malawi, Tuvalu, Tonga and Micronesia.
Why do all the Polynesian countries support Israel so strongly?
Cheap votes to buy or bully. Simply too poor to afford a conscience.
They nearly always follow USA in voting, so Israel gets supported indirectly.
The COFA states are very strongly aligned with the US and pretty much always vote with them. I don’t know much about, say, Tonga, but I’m guessing it’s a way of signaling cooperation to the US as well.
Why is Czechia obvious?
It is possible none of us will live to see Czechia vote against the interest of Israel as all parties support it and there is pretty much no organized pro-Palestine movement. Israel says we’re their top partners in the eastern hemisphere, which means a lot because most countries are in the eastern hemisphere, including itself. At least, aid toward them is not nearly as popular among politicians and citizens as for Ukraine (we have a sizable, well-behaved Ukrainian minority already and took the most refugees per capita at the height of the crisis).
As for why pretty much every politician is either oblivious or bootlicking Israel: see my comment under a post about the shredder escapade 4 months ago
Thank you for the explanation! Such a shame that anti-Zionism is so often conflated with antisemitism
What’s funny is that lots of people outside Prague are racist and most of them make no effort to hide it. Our nation very much prides itself in dark humor and very few topics are taboo, we even have racial and Auschwitz jokes. However, most people are oblivious to what’s happening in the area so even if you made a really good point for Palestine and composed it into a joke, it’s not going to resonate with any audience. Maybe university students (though a great deal of them are pro-Israel so you might get cringey faces and boos).
Besides the obvious Genocide Joe administration countries like Palau, Tuvalu, and Micronesia do not evoke much significance.
Rather I found listing the more mainstream countries still silently supporting israel and refusing to condemn their obvious violation of international law more interesting.
On closer consideration Hungary might be of relevance, since they are allegedly responsible for the recent israeli supply chain terror attack on Lebanon.
Palau, Tuvalu, and Micronesia do not evoke much significance
Well, that’s why I kinda sorted the list by “relevance”. Still, you should at least mention top 5-6 opposers if you’re going to bother with any abstainers.
So we’re back to genociding Israel again? I feel like no one has a plan that isn’t at least a little genocide.
Ploutocide.
Hamas has already agreed to no longer govern the Gaza Strip, as long as Palestinians receive liberation and a unified government can take place.
During the current war, Hamas officials have said that the group does not want to return to ruling Gaza and that it advocates for forming a government of technocrats to be agreed upon by the various Palestinian factions. That government would then prepare for elections in Gaza and the West Bank, with the intention of forming a unified government.
Both Hamas and Fatah have agreed to a Two-State solution based on the 1967 borders for decades. Oslo and Camp David were used by Israel to continue settlements in the West Bank and maintain an Apartheid, while preventing any actual Two-State solution
Sources
Oslo Accord Sources: MEE, NYT, Haaretz, AJ
The settlements represent land-grabbing, and land-grabbing and peace-making don’t go together, it is one or the other. By its actions, if not always in its rhetoric, Israel has opted for land-grabbing and as we speak Israel is expanding settlements. So, Israel has been systematically destroying the basis for a viable Palestinian state and this is the declared objective of the Likud and Netanyahu who used to pretend to accept a two-state solution. In the lead up to the last election, he said there will be no Palestinian state on his watch. The expansion of settlements and the wall mean that there cannot be a viable Palestinian state with territorial contiguity. The most that the Palestinians can hope for is Bantustans, a series of enclaves surrounded by Israeli settlements and Israeli military bases.
- Avi Shlaim
How Avi Shlaim moved from two-state solution to one-state solution
‘One state is a game changer’: A conversation with Ilan Pappe
Hamas officials should be held accountable for all war crimes committed, same as all Israeli officials. That said, there are many parallels between the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising and Gaza.
In the Shadow of the Holocaust by Masha Gessen, the situation in Gaza is compared to the Warsaw Ghettos. The comparison was also made by a Palestinian poet who was later killed by an Israeli airstrike. Adi Callai, an Israeli, has also written on the parallels in his article The Gaza Ghetto Uprising and expanded upon in his corresponding video
My slopes aren’t as slippery, where did you buy yours? I get why you said that, given the tumultuous nature surrounding Israel since it’s founding in the 1940’s, but the Arab nations said they would cease aggression when Israel did. Perhaps Israel having it’s sticks taken away is a step towards a peaceful Middle-East?
Good
They never had that right to begin with. A foreign military force has no right to self defense from the occupied people.
Israel is illegally occupying Palestine. The violence they commit is the furthest possible thing from self defense.
