Erdogan: The United Nations should adapt the use of force if Israel doesn’t stop launching attacks in Gaza and Lebanon
The Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called on the United Nations on Monday to recommend the use of force if Israel doesn’t stop launching attacks in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon.
“The UN General Assembly must quickly use the power to recommend the use of force, as it did in the 1950 Uniting for Peace resolution, if the Security Council cannot show the necessary will,” Erdogan said after a government meeting in Ankara.
He also urged Islamic countries to take economic, diplomatic and political steps against Israel to pressure it to accept a ceasefire, adding that “Israel’s attacks will target them (Islamic countries) as well, if they aren’t stopped soon”.
According to General Assembly resolution (377 of 1950), known as “Uniting for Peace”, if the Security Council is unable to act because of lack of unanimity among its five permanent members with veto power, the Assembly has the power to make recommendations to the Members of the United Nations for collective measures to maintain or restore international peace and security.
Most often the UN Security Council decides when and where a UN peacekeeping operation should be deployed, but historically, when the Council has been unable to make a decision, the General Assembly has done so, as in 1956 when the Assembly established the first emergency force (UNIFIL) in the Middle East.
The first time the Security Council authorized the use of force was in 1950 in what was called a military enforcement action, to secure the withdrawal of North Korean forces from the Republic of Korea.
Last Saturday, Erdogan accused Israel of committing genocide in Lebanon, describing its attacks that killed hundreds of civilians, in addition to its attacks that targeted Hezbollah and claimed the lives of a number of its leaders, most notably its Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah, as brutal.
Erdogan wrote on X, “Lebanon and the Lebanese people are the new target of the policy of genocide, occupation and invasion that Israel has been implementing since October 7,” referring to the Israeli war in Gaza.
