NEW YORK, December 11./TASS/. Staff of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) feel "abandoned" after the US vetoed a UN resolution demanding an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza, the UNRWA chief said.

They feel "abandoned by the international community," UNRWA Commissioner General Philippe Lazzarini told CNN. "They still cannot understand why, after 17,000 people have been killed, after the almost entire population has been displaced, we still cannot agree on a ceasefire," the agency’s chief said. According to Lazzarini, his staff felt "deep frustration, deep disappointment, [and] outrage" after the UN failed to approve the resolution.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7 after militants from the Gaza Strip-based radical Palestinian group Hamas launched a surprise incursion on Israeli territory, killing many Israeli kibbutz residents living near the Gaza border and abducting more than 200 Israelis, including women, children and the elderly. Hamas described its attack as a response to the Israeli authorities’ aggressive actions against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City. Israel declared a total blockade of the Gaza Strip and launched bombardments of the enclave and some areas in Lebanon and Syria, as well as a ground operation against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

On December 1, the Israeli army accused Hamas of violating the truce that had been in effect since November 24 and announced that it would resume fighting in the Gaza Strip. Palestinian authorities hold the US responsible for the renewed Israeli aggression.