The U.N. Security Council will vote Monday on a resolution backing U.S. President Donald Trump’s Gaza peace plan, diplomats said, while Russia submitted a rival draft resolution, setting up a confrontation among the council’s veto powers.
Last week the Americans officially launched negotiations within the 15-member Security Council on a text that would follow up on a cease-fire in Israel’s two-year war on the Gaza Strip and endorse Trump's plan.
A draft of the resolution seen Thursday by AFP "welcomes the establishment of the Board of Peace," a transitional governing body for Gaza, that Trump would theoretically chair, with a mandate running until the end of 2027.
It would authorize member states to form a "temporary International Stabilization Force (ISF)" that would work with Israel and Egypt and newly trained Palestinian police to help secure border areas and demilitarize the Gaza Strip.
Unlike previous drafts, the latest mentions a possible future Palestinian state.
The United States and several Arab and Muslim-majority nations including Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Türkiye called Friday for the U.N. Security Council to quickly adopt the resolution.
"The United States, Qatar, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Pakistan, Jordan, and Türkiye express our joint support for the Security Council Resolution currently under consideration," the countries said in a joint statement, adding they were seeking the measure's "swift adoption."
Friday's joint statement comes as Russia circulated a competing draft resolution to Council members that does not authorize the creation of a board of peace or the immediate deployment of an international force in Gaza, according to the text seen Friday by AFP.
The Russian version welcomes "the initiative that led to the cease-fire" but does not name Trump.
It also only calls on the U.N. secretary-general to submit a report that addresses the possibilities of deploying an international stabilization force in war-ravaged Gaza.
The United States has called the cease-fire "fragile," and warned Friday of the risks of not adopting its draft.
"Any refusal to back this resolution is a vote either for the continued reign of Hamas terrorists or for the return to war with Israel, condemning the region and its people to perpetual conflict," the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Mike Waltz, wrote in The Washington Post.
"Every departure from this path, be it by those who wish to play political games or to relitigate the past, will come with a real human cost."
While it seemed until now that Council members supported principles of the peace plan, diplomatic sources noted there were questions about the U.S. text, particularly regarding the absence of a monitoring mechanism by the Council, the role of the Palestinian Authority, and details of the ISF's mandate.
The Russian U.N. mission said in a statement that its alternative proposal differed by recognizing the principle of a "two-State solution for the Israeli-Palestinian settlement."
"Unfortunately, these provisions were not given due regard in the U.S. draft," it said.
