On Wednesday, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 2817, demanding Iran halt its missile and drone attacks on Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Jordan. 135 countries lined up to co-sponsor the text, the largest co-sponsorship of a Security Council resolution in UN history. The message was glaringly obvious: the resolution did not call for Iran to halt its missile attacks targeting Israel’s civilian centers. Somehow, the UNSC and all of the signing nations were able to give a pass for the roughly 300 ballistic missiles Iran has fired at Israeli cities, killing 13 people and wounding over 2,000. There was not a single word of condemnation for attacks that killed Israelis.
The resolution, passed 13-0 with abstentions from China and Russia, demands “the immediate cessation of all attacks by the Islamic Republic of Iran against Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Jordan.” It also condemns Iranian interference with navigation through the Strait of Hormuz. What it does not do is acknowledge that Iran has been simultaneously raining missiles on Israeli population centers. The IDF Home Front Command has confirmed that Iran deliberately targeted civilian population centers, not just military sites and infrastructure.
Despite the UNSC ignoring the Iranian attacks on Israeli civilian centers, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar sent a formal letter to US Ambassador Mike Waltz, who currently serves as president of the Security Council, urging a direct response to Iran’s attacks across the region. “The Iranian regime’s recent actions underscore that its aggression constitutes a direct threat not only to Israel, but to regional and international peace and security,” Sa’ar wrote. “I urge the UN Security Council to condemn Iran and immediately designate the IRGC as a terrorist organization.” In his letter, Sa’ar defended Israel’s decision to strike Iran in conjunction with the United States beginning February 28, citing Iran’s openly declared objective to annihilate Israel and its pursuit of nuclear weapons. He also noted that Iran’s attacks have not been limited to Israel; they have struck neighboring states across the Middle East and Cyprus as well, and Iran’s campaign to shut down international shipping through the Strait of Hormuz constitutes an additional violation of international law. “Israel calls upon the Security Council to condemn Iran’s acts of hostilities across the region, as well as its decades-long destabilizing activity.” Sa’ar further pointed out that the US and European Union have already designated the IRGC as a terrorist organization, and called on the Security Council to follow suit. The Council passed its resolution the following day. It did not mention Israel.
The silence on Israel is more galling given what Iran has actually been firing. Approximately half of the roughly 300 ballistic missiles Iran has launched at Israel in the current war carried cluster bomb warheads, munitions designed specifically to wound and kill people across a wide dispersal area. The use of cluster munitions is banned under the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions, whose more than 100 signatories include the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, and most of Europe and Africa. Neither Iran, Israel, nor the United States has signed the convention, but that legal technicality does not change what cluster bombs do to human bodies, or what it means that Iran chose to use them against Israeli civilians.
US Ambassador Mike Waltz put it plainly after the vote: “Iran’s strategy of sowing chaos, of trying to hold their neighbors hostage, trying to shake the resolve of the region, has clearly backfired, as shown by this vote today.” The evidence on the ground supports him. At Oman’s Port of Salalah, firefighters battled blazes at fuel storage tanks after days of Iranian strikes. In Bahrain, Iranian-linked attacks targeted fuel tanks in Muharraq Governorate. Near Dubai International Airport, two Iranian drones wounded four people. A drone landed on a building near Dubai Creek Harbor. The destruction has been real and sustained.
Iran’s UN Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani called the resolution “a manifest injustice against my country, the main victim of a clear act of aggression.” China and Russia, who both abstained rather than veto, called the text “extremely unbalanced” for not mentioning US and Israeli strikes on Iran. Bahrain’s UN Ambassador Jamal Fares Alrowaiei, who introduced the resolution, framed the issue in terms of global economic stakes: “Ensuring the security of this region is not merely a regional matter; it is a common international responsibility that is closely linked to the stability of the global economy and energy security.”
UN Secretary-General Guterres, in later remarks, condemned Iranian attacks on Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, but notably omitted Israel from the list. It was not an oversight. It was a pattern.
Iran fired cluster bombs at Israeli cities. Thirteen Israelis are dead. Over two thousand are wounded. Israel’s foreign minister formally called on the Security Council to act. The Council passed a resolution the next day that didn’t mention Israel once.
