Israel-Hamas war: UN adopts resolution, India votes against Israeli settlements in occupied Palestine
Israel is currently engaged in a bloody conflict with Hamas militants who control the Gaza Strip. More than 10,000 Palestinians have been killed during the Israeli army’s (IDF) counter-offensive.
Israel Hamas War Latest update: The United Nations has adopted a resolution condemning Israeli settlement activities in occupied Palestinian territory. The draft resolution, which was adopted on November 9 (Thursday), was passed by an overwhelming majority, with 145 countries, including India, voting for and against “illegal Israeli settlements”.
The resolution entitled ‘Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem, and the occupied Syrian Golan’ was introduced by the UN to condemn ‘Israel’s illegal settlement activities in Palestinian lands’.
Only seven countries – the United States, Canada, Israel, Hungary, the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia and Nauru – voted against the resolution, while 18 members abstained.
India has reiterated its position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and while it maintains cordial ties with the Jewish nation, New Delhi has maintained that it favors the two-state solution that envisions a separate Palestinian state, free from any form of Israeli influence.
Prime Minister Modi reiterates India’s position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
On October 18 and ten days after the war broke out between Hamas fighters and Israel, Prime Minister Narendra Modi called Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and reiterated India’s long-standing “principled position” on the Israeli-Palestinian issue.
Modi told Abbas that India remains steadfast on the two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He also said New Delhi will continue to send humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people.
In a telephone conversation, Prime Minister Modi simultaneously shared Abbas India’s “deep concerns” over terrorism, violence and the deteriorating security situation in the region, an official statement said.
“Spoke with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. I expressed my condolences for the loss of civilian lives at Al Ahli Hospital in Gaza,” Prime Minister Modi said on ‘X’.
“We will continue to send humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people. Shared our deep concern about terrorism, violence and the deteriorating security situation in the region,” he said.
“Reiterated India’s long-standing principled position on the Israeli-Palestinian issue,” the Prime Minister added.
India calls for strict compliance with international humanitarian law
Speaking in the backdrop of an attack on a hospital in the Gaza Strip that sparked global outrage, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said India is concerned about civilian casualties and the humanitarian situation.
We insist on strict compliance with international humanitarian law, he said during his weekly media briefing, answering questions about the attack on the hospital, which killed at least 500 Palestinians.
We strongly condemned the heinous attack on Israel, Bagchi said, adding that the international community must stand together in the fight against terrorism in all its forms.
On the Palestinian issue, he said India reiterated its position in favor of direct negotiations on a two-state solution.
Recently, Israeli Ambassador Naor Gilon had urged India to ban Gaza-based militant group Hamas as a terrorist organization. “It is time for India to declare Hamas as a terrorist organization in India,” Gilon had said, adding that many countries have already done so.
Israel-Hamas war
Israel is currently engaged in a bloody conflict with Hamas militants who control the Gaza Strip.
Since the start of hostilities, more than 10,000 Palestinians have been killed in the counter-offensive launched by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) in retaliation for the October 7 attacks.
According to official Israeli sources, at least 1,400 Israelis and foreigners have been murdered in Israel.
Three babies die as Gaza hospital goes ‘out of service’
On Saturday, three babies reportedly died in the neonatal ward of Al-Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza after the hospital went “out of service” amid continued Israeli fire in the area, CNN reported citing the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health.
According to the report, in which Dr. Munir Al-Bursh, director general of the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health, is quoted as saying that doctors in the neonatal ward are now being forced to manually perform artificial respiration on the 36 babies they are treating at the hospital. Hopital.
Bursh also said the hospital was “surrounded on all four sides,” estimating that 400 people were being treated at the hospital and about 20,000 displaced persons were seeking shelter in the hospital complex.
The spokesman for the Hamas-led Ministry of Health in Gaza, Dr. Ashraf al-Qidra, said he was being held in the al-Shifa complex.
Dr. Qidra said in a statement to CNN that the complex is currently “out of service” after being repeatedly targeted by Israeli fire.
“The intensive care unit, the pediatric ward and the oxygen equipment are no longer working,” said Dr. Qidra.
The IDF has regularly said that Hamas uses hospitals and other civilian infrastructure in Gaza as cover for its military operations. It has also warned civilians in northern Gaza to move south, CNN reported.
(With input from agencies)