Dozens of American rabbis have disrupted the United Nations General Assembly in New York to urge Washington not to stand in the way of an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
During their protest on Tuesday, the rabbis carried banners that read “Biden: The World Says Ceasefire” and called on the US president to “stop vetoing peace.”
After they were escorted from the premises by security staff, they held a press conference outside the UN.
Rabbi Alyssa Wise, one of the advocates of the Gaza ceasefire, told a reporter that they are watching in horror as the US government “single-handedly blocks Israel’s efforts to stop bombing and starving Gaza.”
She added: “We pray here because the United Nations is a place where meaningful diplomatic action is taken to stop the violence and because prayer is where we as rabbis know how to express our fears, dreams, hopes and frustrations.”
Rabbi Abby Stein, a member of Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, said the UN was created in the aftermath of the Second World War and the Nazi Holocaust that targeted Jewish people, to ensure that such atrocities would never happen again.
One of the other rabbis in the gathering said: “Our government refuses to represent this very popular demand. We came here directly to represent ourselves and our Jewish values.”
Tuesday’s meeting came after the US vetoed a proposal by Russia to amend a Security Council resolution to include a call for a ceasefire in Gaza.
Russia had proposed an amendment to the resolution calling for “an urgent and sustainable cessation of hostilities.” The US vetoed this proposed change.
In continuation of the tense atmosphere in the UN Security Council, Russia’s deputy permanent representative to the UN, Anna Ustigneva, said that when Washington used its veto in the Security Council on December 22, it was trying to protect Israel from its actions; with this, it played the “cowardly game.”
