India was among 13 countries that abstained as the UN Human Rights Council on Friday adopted a resolution calling for Israel to be held accountable for possible war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
The resolution passed with 28 of the council’s 47 member states voting in favour. The United States and Germany were among the six countries that opposed it.
The Council adopted five resolutions, including a text in which it demanded that Israel immediately lift its blockade on the Gaza Strip and all other forms of collective punishment, calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. It called upon all States to take immediate action to prevent the continued forcible transfer of Palestinians within or from Gaza and to cease the sale, transfer and diversion of arms, munitions and other military equipment to Israel.
Friday’s vote marked the first time that the UN’s top rights body has taken a position on the nearly six-month war, highlighting warnings of “genocide” in the conflict that has killed more than 33,000 people.
The council said the vote was a necessary measure, among other things, “to prevent further violations of international humanitarian law and violations and abuses of human rights”.
The five resolutions concerned the human rights situation in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, realising the rights of the child and inclusive social protection, the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, human rights in the occupied Syrian Golan, and Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and in the occupied Syrian Golan.
On the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, the Council adopted by a vote of 42 in favour, 2 against and 3 abstentions, a resolution in which it called upon Israel, the occupying power, to immediately end its occupation of the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and to reverse and redress any impediments to the political independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Palestine, and reaffirmed its support for the solution of two States, Palestine and Israel, living side by side in peace and security.
