Israel-Hamas war: US pressures Australia to vote down UN motion on Israel

The United States is pressuring Australia to vote down a UN motion demanding Israel withdraw from Gaza and the West Bank. Follow updates.

The US is urging Australia and its allies to reject a draft resolution by the Palestinian Authority calling for an immediate Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and the West Bank.

The proposed resolution, being raised before the UN General Assembly on Thursday AEST, also demands sanctions against the Jewish state.

The eight-page motion, the first by Palestine since it became a de facto UN member four months ago with the support of Australia and 142 other nations, calls for reparations for Palestinians, sanctions and travel bans on Israelis linked to the occupation of the territories, and a ban on arms sales to the Jewish state.

The US is urging its allies and partners to reject the draft resolution or at least abstain from voting on it.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong’s office declined to comment on Australia’s voting intentions.

Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham called on the government to declare its opposition to the draft resolution “without hesitation or ambiguity”, The Australian reports.

While the Security Council is largely paralyzed on the Gaza issue - with the United States repeatedly vetoing censures of its ally Israel - the General Assembly has adopted several texts in support of Palestinian civilians amid the current war.

A Palestinian boy walks amid debris following Israeli bombardment in Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip. Picture: AFP

It comes as Israeli strikes on several homes killed at least 18 people overnight, according to Gaza medics.

The latest strikes came as Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant warned that prospects for a halt in fighting with Hezbollah militants along the Lebanon border were dimming, yet again raising fears of a wider regional conflagration.

Meanwhile, senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan claimed the militants had ample resources to sustain its fight nearly a year into the war.

“The resistance has a high ability to continue,” he said.

In addition to the loss of life, there was “the recruitment of new generations into the resistance.”

His comments came less than a week after Gallant told journalists that Hamas, whose October 7 attack triggered the war, “no longer exists” as a military formation in Gaza.

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BLINKEN TO DISCUSS NEW CEASEFIRE DEAL WITH EGYPT

While months of mediated negotiations and shuttle diplomacy have failed to pin down a truce, Washington said it was still pushing all sides to finalise an agreement.

To bridge the remaining gaps, the United States is working “expeditiously” on a new proposal, according to State Department spokesman Matthew Miller.

Miller said US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will discuss the ceasefire drive with Egyptian officials on a visit there this week.

Blinken will “discuss ongoing efforts to reach a ceasefire in Gaza that secures the release of all hostages, alleviates the suffering of the Palestinian people, and helps establish broader regional security”, Miller said in a statement.

Netanyahu has publicly rejected US assessments that the deal is nearly complete and has insisted on an Israeli military presence on the Egypt-Gaza border.

Mounting international and domestic pressure has failed to sway him to agree to a hostage release deal that has wide support from the Israeli public.

NETANYAHU EXPANDS WAR GOALS

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday expanded the country’s goals for the war in Gaza, vowing to allow Israelis who fled areas near the Lebanon border to return to their homes.

Nearly a year after Hamas’s October 7 attack sparked war in the Gaza Strip, cross-border fire has been traded almost daily between Israeli forces and the Iran-backed Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, which says it is supporting its Palestinian ally.

The exchanges have killed hundreds of mostly fighters in Lebanon, and dozens of civilians and soldiers on the Israeli side.

It has also forced tens of thousands of people on both sides from their homes. “The political-security cabinet updated the goals of the war this evening, so that they include the following section: the safe return of the residents of the north to their homes,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement released early Tuesday.

The day before, Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant told a visiting US envoy that “military action” was the “only way left to ensure the return of Israel’s northern communities”.

SEARCH FOR SURVIVORS

Deadly fighting rages on in the Gaza Strip, with survivors seen searching through the debris of crushed buildings following a strike on the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.

Ten people were killed and 15 others were wounded when an air strike hit the home of the Al-Qassas family in Nuseirat, a medic at Al-Awda hospital, where the bodies were brought, told AFP.

Family and friends mourn by the bodies of five members of the Alborno family at Al-Ahli Arab hospital, also known as the Baptist hospital in Gaza City. Picture: AFP

“My house was hit while we were sleeping without any prior warning. There are many martyrs, among them the sons of my family and my little grandsons,” said Rashed al-Qassas, a surviving family member.

Gaza’s civil defence agency said six Palestinians were killed in a similar air strike during the night on a house belonging to the Bassal family in Gaza City’s Zeitun neighbourhood, a regular target of Israeli military raids since the war began.

Two people were killed in another overnight air strike in Rafah that targeted a house belonging to the Abu Shaar family, the agency said.

A man is comforted as he mourns his son who was killed in Israeli bombardment on a bakery, at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip. Picture: AFP

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said that at least 41,226 people have been killed in the war between Israel and Palestinian militants, now in its 12th month.

The toll includes 20 deaths in the previous 24 hours, according to the ministry, which said 95,413 people have been wounded in the Gaza Strip since the war began when Hamas militants attacked Israel on October 7.

ISRAEL-HEZBOLLAH TENSIONS SURGE

The war has drawn in Iran-backed fighters from across the region, including in Lebanon, Syria, Yemen and Iraq.

Tensions have surged along Israel’s northern border with Lebanon, amid fears the violence could explode into an all-our war.

A smoke plume billows during Israeli bombardment on the village of Kfarshuba in south Lebanon near the border with Israel. Picture: AFP

“The possibility for an agreed framework in the northern arena is running out as Hezbollah continues to ‘tie itself’ to Hamas,” Gallant told US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin in a phone call.

Gallant “reiterated Israel’s commitment to the removal of Hezbollah presence in southern Lebanon, and to enabling the safe return of Israel’s northern communities to their homes”.

Israeli media outlets said Amos Hochstein, the special envoy of US President Joe Biden, has arrived in Israel to help defuse tensions between Israel and Hezbollah.

Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah group has traded near-daily cross-border fire with Israeli forces since October 7.

The cross-border violence since early October has killed 623 people in Lebanon, mostly fighters but also including at least 141 civilians, according to an AFP tally.

On the Israeli side, including in the annexed Golan Heights, authorities have announced the deaths of at least 24 soldiers and 26 civilians.

Gallant’s warning also comes after Yemen’s Huthi rebels claimed a rare missile attack on central Israel, sparking vows of retaliation from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“They should have known by now that we charge a heavy price for any attempt to harm us,” the Israeli premier said.

Firefighters douse flames in a field after a drone launched from southern Lebanon fell near Senir Kibbutz in the Upper Galilee in northern Israel. Picture: AFP

The Huthis said they had “penetrated” Israel’s air defences, while Israel said the missile likely fragmented mid-air but was not destroyed.

In a televised speech, the Huthis’ leader said the rebels and their regional allies were “preparing to do even more”.

“Our operations will continue as long as the aggression and siege on Gaza continue,” Abdul Malik al-Huthi said.

‘HIGH PROBABILITY’ IDF KILLED HOSTAGES IN AIR STRIKE

Israel’s military has said that there is a “high probability” three hostages held by Hamas and found dead months ago were killed in an Israeli air strike and not by the terror group.

The IDF has announced the findings in an investigation into the deaths of Nik Beizer, Ron Sherman, and Elia Toledano, determining that the three were likely killed in a November air strike.

The three Israeli hostages were kidnapped in the October 7 attack by Hamas militants and their bodies were recovered in December.

In the report the IDF said based on where the bodies were found, pathology reports and forensic evidence, “it is not possible to definitely determine the circumstances of their deaths” but there was a “high probability” the Israeli military strike killed them.

Families of hostages held in the Gaza Strip set off flares as they block a main road during a rally calling for an hostages deal in Tel Aviv, Israel. Picture: Amir Levy/Getty Images

“The findings of the investigation suggest a high probability that the three were killed as a result of a by-product of an IDF air strike, during the elimination of the Hamas Northern Brigade commander, Ahmed Ghandour, on November 10th, 2023,” the military said in a statement, referring to the three captives.

The bodies of the three hostages were recovered on December 14. The military said its investigation revealed that the three captives had been held in a tunnel complex from which Ghandour operated.

“At the time of the strike, the IDF did not have information about the presence of hostages in the targeted compound,” the military said.

“Furthermore, there was information suggesting that they were located elsewhere, and thus the area was not designated as one with suspected presence of hostages.”

‘LEAVE YOUR HOMES’: ISRAEL DROPS LEAFLETS IN LEBANON

Israel has dropped leaflets telling Lebanon residents to evacuate from a border village.

It was the first time Israelis had told residents of south Lebanon to evacuate in 11 months of cross-border fire between Hezbollah and Israel over the Gaza war, triggered by Hezbollah ally Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel.

The leaflets read in Arabic: “To all residents and refugees living in the area of the camps, Hezbollah is firing from your region. You must immediately leave your homes and head north of the Khiam region before 4pm (1300 GMT). Do not return to this area until the end of the war.”

Syrian refugees gather their belongings and prepare to leave the southern Lebanese village of Wazzani after the Israeli army dropped leaflets calling for them to evacuate. Picture: AFP

It added: “Anyone present in this area after this time will be considered a terrorist.”

The area is an agricultural region where Syrians are often hired to work the land.

Asked about the incident, an Israeli military spokeswoman said the leaflets had been dropped by drone in an area from which rockets had been fired into northern Israel.

“This was an initiative of the 769 Brigade, it was not approved by the Northern Command. An investigation has been opened,” she added.

“Some of the Syrian workers are leaving the area … But as for us, we are farmers and we have livestock. We cannot leave our land,” Mayor Mohammed said.

– with AFP

Originally published as Israel-Hamas war: US pressures Australia to vote down UN motion on Israel