التصنيف: estaql

A United Nations Security Council resolution to demand a ceasefire in Gaza has failed after it was vetoed by the US.

Of the 15 representatives on the UN member council, 13 voted to back the call but the US blocked it and the UK abstained.

After the vote, US deputy ambassador Robert Wood criticised the council for its failure to condemn Hamas’s 7 October attack on Israel, and for failing to acknowledge Israel’s right to defend itself.

Follow latest: ‘At least 10 killed’ in Israeli airstrike on family home

He said halting military action would allow Hamas to continue to rule and “only plant the seeds for the next war, because Hamas has no desire to see a durable peace, to see a two-state solution”.

“For that reason, while the United States strongly supports a durable peace, in which both Israelis and Palestinians can live in peace and security, we do not support calls for an immediate ceasefire,” Wood added.

The deputy ambassador also called the now-scrapped resolution “imbalanced” and “divorced from reality”, saying it “would not move the needle on the ground in any concrete way”.

The UK’s ambassador to the UN, Barbara Woodward, said: “We cannot vote in favour of a resolution which does not condemn the atrocities Hamas committed against innocent Israeli civilians on 7 October.

“Calling for a ceasefire ignores the fact that Hamas has committed acts of terror and is still holding civilians hostage.”

UN secretary-general, Antonio Guterres, warned earlier that Gaza was at “breaking point” and desperate people are at serious risk of starvation.

He added the UN believes it will result in “a complete breakdown of public order and increased pressure for mass displacement into Egypt”.

Read more from Sky News:
Video appears to show Israeli forces detain and strip dozens of Palestinians

An emergency meeting of the council was called after Mr Guterres invoked Article 99 of the UN Charter for the first time since 1971.

Article 99 allows the secretary-general to “bring any matter which in his opinion may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security”.

Israel’s UN ambassador Gilad Erdan stressed regional stability “can only be achieved once Hamas is eliminated – not one minute before”.

“So the true path to ensure peace is only through supporting Israel’s mission – absolutely not to call for a ceasefire,” he told the council.

“Israel committed itself to the elimination of Hamas’s capabilities for the sole reason of ensuring that such horrors could never be repeated again. And if Hamas is not destroyed, such horrors will be repeated.”

Ziad Issa, head of humanitarian policy at ActionAid UK, said: “It is devastating to see the UK miss this critical opportunity to vote to call for a permanent ceasefire and end the unbearable suffering of 2.3 million people in Gaza.

“With aid operations no longer able to meaningfully function anywhere in the territory and infrastructure on the brink of collapse, now is the moment for international action.”

The crowd of mourners had thinned over the course of the lengthy service, but who could blame them?

The wind howled and blew gusts of rain through their ranks, on a bleak wintry day in Nenagh.

But then a moment of utter warmth flowed from inside the St Mary of the Rosary church and enveloped those outside.

The strains of the song that will forever shape Shane MacGowan’s legacy, Fairytale of New York, drifted out, and the crowd sparked into life, bellowing the lyrics into the dark sky, lifting their phones above their heads.

The irony – by the time of his death MacGowan was truly fed-up of the song – was irrelevant. Inside the church, Shane’s widow Victoria spun around in front of the altar, as a joyous jig broke out among the mourners. They were dancing in the aisles.

His sister Siobhan rose to deliver a eulogy after the performance. Smiling, she told mourners: “Wow, I think Shane would have enjoyed that.”

Throughout the day, Fairytale had been piped over the town’s PA system, the snarling festive duet serenading shoppers, along with the rest of the Pogues’ back catalogue. Here in Nenagh, his childhood home, he was just known as Shane.

“An ordinary bloke”. That’s how local music shop owner Noel McQuaid described the late singer, who would often pop by to buy CDs of traditional Irish music.

“He didn’t want to be treated different, and we didn’t treat him different, anyone in Nenagh. That’s the way he wanted it.

“I think I’ve died and gone to heaven”, said Father Pat Gilbert, after the remaining Pogues members performed in his church, having already informed the congregation of his fanhood.

Read more:
MacGowan obituary: A wild life and a raw talent
Wife reveals details of singer’s final days

Earlier in the day, we had seen more scenes of celebration on the streets of Dublin, Shane’s adopted home, as his cortege wound its way through the streets, with fans lifting pints of Guinness and bursting into song. Some threw flowers.

Josie Feeney, from Co Leitrim, travelled to Dublin to pay her respects.

She said: “My father’s family were from Tipperary, my grandmother was from Nenagh.

“We don’t always know all the lyrics but this week we know more of Shane’s lyrics, they are really very moving, they are poetry. He was a genius.”

Shane MacGowan, according to his widow, hated going to funerals, and tried to avoid them.

This was no funeral in the normal sense of the word. It was a long, raucous and slightly chaotic celebration of a hugely chaotic and much loved icon of modern Ireland.