On March 25, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 2728 , regarding the ongoing war in Gaza, by a vote of 14-0. The United States abstained rather than – as it usually does when the Israeli regime dislikes a resolution – using its “permanent member” veto.
The meat of the resolution “[d]emands an immediate ceasefire for the month of Ramadan respected by all parties leading to a lasting sustainable ceasefire, and also demands the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages, as well as ensuring humanitarian access to address their medical and other humanitarian needs, and further demands that the parties comply with their obligations under international law in relation to all persons they detain.”
I have several questions about the resolution, including whether “all hostages” includes the thousands of Palestinian Arabs held by the Israeli regime, often for years, often without charge or trial. They’re not usually referred to as “hostages” by Israel or its allied regimes, but since they’re occasionally traded off for Israeli captives, they’re “hostages” by definition.
A second question: Why just until the end of Ramadan (April 8)? If the UN Security Council wants an end to the fighting, why not demand a PERMANENT end to the fighting?
But here’s the big question:
Now that the UN Security Council has issued its demands, how are UN member states, especially the US, going to enforce those demands?
UN Security Council resolutions are binding on all UN member states.
If this resolution means anything at all, the initial response SHOULD be for all UN member states to immediately declare and enforce a ban on the sale or delivery of arms to the belligerent parties.
Yet White House National Security Communications Advisor John Kirby insisted at a press briefing that “we are still providing tools and capabilities, weapons systems so that Israel can defend itself… no change by this nonbinding resolution on what Israel can or cannot do in terms of defending itself.”
The resolution is not “nonbinding.” The Security Council HAS ordered a ceasefire, the the US regime IS bound by that order, and Kirby’s opinion that murdering tens of thousands of civilians and subjecting hundreds of thousands to starvation, etc. constitutes Israel “defending itself” doesn’t magically change so much as a comma in that resolution or an atom of that obligation.
While it’s a given that some other regimes are also going to flout a system of international law they loudly invoke when they find it convenient, the regimes that do take their obligations seriously should start freezing US assets and sanctioning US regime figures until such time as the US regime decides to bring its actions into compliance with the “rules-based international order” it so piously claims to lead and personify.
Thomas L. Knapp is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism, publisher of Rational Review News Digest, and moderator of Antiwar.com’s commenting/discussion community.
Delusions at the United Nations
It is absurd to believe that UNSC resolutions and ICJ orders can stop the Israeli genocide in Gaza.
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/3/30/delusions-at-the-united-nations
I’m afraid that article (extremely disheartening to say the least) in Al Jazeera is absolutely spot on in answering the big question posed in the well-articulated argument in the article above. So no, extremely few states take their obligations under international law, international humanitarian law and international human rights law with anything resembling seriousness at all. If there is a Western state among them it’ll be probably Ireland as the only positive exception.
The point made about the Israel prison system as a hostage-taking industry, being thus itself a criminal enterprise, also a fact that Israel should forever be shamed for and all the more for not being ashamed by it.
I’ll repeat yet again: The Gaza Genocide does not stop until Hamas and Hezbollah have drained Israel and the US of their defensive and offensive stand-off weapons – in the same manner that Russia has drained them in Ukraine – and then Hezbollah can take the fight directly to Israel by destroying Israel’s economic infrastructure and its military capability with its overwhelming stand-off weapon arsenal.
This is undoubtedly the strategy which was developed by Qasem Soleimani (and perhaps Hassan Nasrallah and Hamas) and coordinated among the Axis of Resistance factions in Iran, Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Yemen. Neither Israel nor the US can win that war of attrition because neither are nations capable of expanding their production of the necessary weapons systems fast enough (as the Royal United Services Institute study was the case in Ukraine) to overcome the arsenal buildup Hezbollah and Iran have done over the last 18 years (not to mention having drained much of it by giving it to Ukraine.)
Israel will lose the coming war, Hezbollah will seize northern Israel. the Israeli economy will collapse, most Israelis will flee from Palestine and Zionism will be finished as an ideology Jews will believe in.
Sound plan.
Where do nukes, tactical or otherwise, come into play?
Israel can’t use them nearby.
Tactical nukes? https://www.britannica.com/technology/tactical-nuclear-weapon
That article answered your question:
In other words, depending on the size of the battlefield, a tac nuke can only change the local engagement. In Ukraine, for instance, the 1000km length of the front means you’d need many tactical nukes to offset the Russian advantage – and of course the Russians have many more of them.
In a Hezbollah-Israel war, Israel would have the advantage – until Russia and China got involved, which they likely would. As I’ve said before, Russia can use its hypersonic missiles (without nuclear warheads) to destroy Israel’s launch facilities, so at most Israel would get off only a couple nukes before those facilities were destroyed.
But the real problem for Israel is the geopolitical fallout – literally, the whole world (except the US and the EU) would come down on them for using nukes against a non-nuclear enemy – especially if they used them against Iran. Even with nukes, Israel would not survive.
That said, I don’t doubt Israel will at least threaten to use them (they did in 1973) and probably would use them.