UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 23 (UPI) -- The U.N. Security Council after a marathon debate and bargaining session early Tuesday passed 14-0 a resolution demanding an end to all violence in the Middle East.
However, the United States abstained from the vote.
The measure demanded the "complete cessation of all acts of violence, including all acts of terror, provocation, incitement and destruction" in the Middle East. It was the fourth measure considered by the 15-member panel since 10 a.m. EDT Monday.
It also demanded that Israel "cease measures in and around Ramallah (where Palestinian Chairman Yasser Arafat's compound is located) including the destruction of Palestinian civilian and security infrastructure" and "the expeditious withdrawal of the Israeli occupying forces from Palestinian cities towards return to positions held prior to September 2000" when the Palestinian Intifada began.
The resolution called on the Palestinian Authority "to meet its expressed commitment to ensure that those responsible for terrorist acts are brought to justice by it."
The resolution was sponsored by Britain, Bulgaria, France, Ireland and Norway.
Deputy U.S. Ambassador James Cunningham said, "The resolution that we've adopted this evening (2:18 a.m. EDT, Tuesday) was flawed in our view in that it failed to explicitly condemn the terrorist groups and those that provide them with political cover of support and safe haven in perpetuating conflict in the Middle East."
Those responsible for killing civilians obstruct efforts of the Quartet and Palestinian reform prospects, he said. The Quartet, made up of the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States, last week laid down a three-year roadmap for Middle East peace.
Cunningham named the groups as Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Al-Aqsa Martyr's Brigade.
"The leaders and spokesmen of these groups have openly claimed credit for scores of terrorist bombings, for many deaths and injuries," he said. "Their actions are aimed at the peace process, aimed at Israelis and at Palestinians. This council cannot claim to seriously consider their efforts in the Middle East unless they realize the tragic dynamic at play. Each time a glimmer of hope, however dim, appears a terrorist act rises up to extinguish it."
Washington's envoy explained the United States had hoped the council this time would "assume its responsibilities and to take a clear stand against the actions of these terrorist groups and to call for action against them. This resolution starts that process but it does not go far enough nor does it provide the clarity and context we think is required."
The United States offered the second of the four drafts presented. The initial measure came from Syria while France and Norway collaborated on version No. 3.
"Our draft was more explicit on terrorism, those who perpetuate it and the need to combat it and on strong support for the Quartet," he said. "Because this resolution does not meet that standard and because we do not think it as well conceived or worded as it should be given the importance of the issues it addresses, we have abstained."
Introductory paragraphs of the resolution, reiterated the panel's "grave concern" at the situation in the Middle East, condemned the Sept. 18-19 suicide bombings against Israel, the device found in a Palestinian school in Hebron Sept. 17, and for an end to the siege on Arafat's compound.
The preambular paragraphs also expressed alarm at the "reoccupation of Palestinian cities as well as the severe restrictions imposed on the freedom of movement of persons and goods," grave concern "at the humanitarian crisis being faced by the Palestinian people" and called for the protection of civilians in time of war, part of the 1949 Geneva Conventions.
The recent upsurge of violence in the Middle East marked a regression from the diplomatic initiative put forward last week by the Quartet, Secretary-General Kofi Annan told the Security Council before the debate began.
"Far from seeing the first steps towards implementing the Quartet's vision, the events of the past few days represent a tragic step in the opposite direction," Annan said, adding it followed a period of "relative calm."
Terror attacks "strike directly at the very hope (of a final settlement) which -- as the Quartet agreed -- is an essential driver of the political process," Annan said, and urged all Palestinians to renounce "this wicked instrument of terror."
Reminding that the Quartet had called on the Palestinian Authority to reform security services and combat terrorism, the secretary-general asked how security could be carried out "if what is left of the civil and security infrastructure of the Palestinian Authority -- already gravely weakened -- is now in the process of being destroyed?"
Such destruction would "only set back even further the prospects for implementing necessary reforms and ensuring real improvements in the (Palestinian) Authority's security performance," he said.
"The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is not going to be resolved by military might alone or by violent means of any kind," Annan said. "A policy based on forcing the other side to capitulate is a bankrupt policy. It is not working and it will never work. It only encourages desperation. It weakens moderates and strengthens extremists."
Said the secretary-general, "Israel needs to understand that there will be no lasting security without a political settlement -- and therefore, even while defending itself against terrorist attacks, Israel should cooperate actively with the Quartet's efforts to reach such a settlement within the next three years.
Addressing the Palestinian side, he said there is a "need to understand that there will be no settlement without lasting security for Israel."
Annan was followed by Nasser Al-Kidwa, the official observer of the Palestinians at the United Nations, who denounced Israel's assaults on Arafat's West Bank compound as "grave and illegal criminal acts'' intended to "subjugate the entire Palestinian people'' while perpetuating Israeli settlements on Palestinian lands.
He accused Israel of defying three decades of Security Council resolutions, but asked the council to approve another resolution -- demanding that Israel withdraw from all Palestinian cities as well as Arafat's compound -- and then to "shoulder its responsibilities" and ensure it is enforced.
Ambassador Yehuda Lancry of Israel blamed "Palestinian terrorist groups" for setting back peace efforts and said his country's tough military stance was the only thing standing between the suicide bombers and Israeli civilians.
Bombing attacks resumed just as Israel began to scale back its security operations in response to six weeks of relative calm, he told the council.
"This is the clearest affirmation of what we have constantly asserted -- that the only thing which stands between Palestinian terrorists and their Israeli victims are the preventive actions of the Israeli military," Lancry said. "If the Palestinian leadership is unwilling to confront these demonstrated enemies of peace, then it undermines its claims to be a partner for peace."
