TEL AVIV – Israeli deputy minister Michael Oren on Saturday lambasted France for supporting an “anti-Semitic resolution” at the UN Security Council that condemned Israeli actions during violent riots on the border last month.
Oren’s comments prompted an angry response from French Ambassador to Israel Hélène Le Gal, who charged Oren with “insulting France.”
On Friday the U.S. vetoed a Kuwait-authored UN draft resolution calling for “protective measures” for the Palestinians. The U.S. drafted its own resolution condemning Hamas that failed to pass.
“Praise for the U.S. for vetoing Security Council resolution on Gaza that didn’t mention Hamas and condemned the IDF for defending Israel,” tweeted Oren, who was formerly Israel’s ambassador to Washington.
“Shame on France for supporting it. French government cannot say it’s against anti-Semitism and vote for this anti-Semitic resolution,” he said.
Le Gal blasted Oren, accusing him of not reading the resolution.
“Shame on you M. Oren for insulting France on the eve of the visit of your Prime Minister to Paris,” she tweeted.
“You didn’t read the resolution. It was not perfect but condemned all the violence against Israel. France is adamantly supporting Israel’s security.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is slated to visit Paris and Berlin next week, with talks expected to focus on the Iranian threat.
France, China, and Russia were among ten nations that voted in favor of the draft resolution. Ethiopia, the UK, the Netherlands, and Poland abstained.
U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley slammed the Security Council for its “outrageous” failure to condemn the dozens of rocket attacks on Israel from the Gaza Strip, and said the Arab-backed resolution was “wildly inaccurate in its characterization of recent events in Gaza.”
“It is outrageous for the Security Council to fail to condemn Hamas rocket attacks against Israeli citizens while the Human Rights Council approves sending a team to investigate Israeli actions taken in self-defense,” Haley said at an emergency council meeting.
“The people of Gaza do not need protection from an external source. The people of Gaza need protection from Hamas,” Haley said.
“I urge the members of the Security Council to exercise at least as much scrutiny of the actions of the Hamas terrorist group as it does Israel’s legitimate right of self-defense.”
Haley’s comments came on the heels of a flareup that saw more than 100 mortars and rockets launched at Israel by Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, marking the most serious incident since the 2014 summer conflict between Israel and Hamas. One of the projectiles landed on an Israeli kindergarten shortly before children were expected to arrive and another caused damage to a home in which a family slept. Four soldiers were injured. The barrage prompted Israeli airstrikes on dozens of PIJ and Hamas terror targets all over the Strip.
The U.S. authored its own draft resolution condemning Hamas for its role in the violence in Gaza over the last two months. The U.S. was the only country to vote in favor of the text, with eleven countries abstaining and Bolivia, Kuwait, and Russia opposing it.
Israeli envoy to the UN Danny Danon said, “Peace and stability will come to our region only when the international community is brave enough to call out the terrorists by name.”
He thanked the U.S. for its support, saying, “the rules of the game are changing in the Security Council and that the double standard against Israel will not stand.”
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