US and Israel clash with Iran at emergency Security Council meeting. UN chief condemns attacks

The United States and Israel clashed with Iran at an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council on Saturday where the U.N. chief and many countries urged a halt to their attacks and a return to negotiations to prevent the conflict from spreading further into the region and beyond.

Secretary-General António Guterres told the council that everything must be done to prevent an escalation. “The alternative,” he warned, “is a potential wider conflict with grave consequences for civilians and regional stability.” Guterres said the U.S. and Israeli airstrikes violated international law, including the U.N.

He also condemned Iran’s retaliatory attacks for violating the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. ambassador to the United Nations, Mike Waltz, insisted the U.S. military action was lawful.

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“Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon,” he told the council. “That principle is not a matter of politics. It’s a matter of global security.

And to that end, the United States is taking lawful actions.” Israel’s U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon defended the airstrikes as necessary to stop an existential threat. “We are stopping extremism before it becomes unstoppable,” he said.

“We will ensure that no radical regime armed with nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles can threaten our people or the entire world.” Amir Saeid Iravani, Iran’s ambassador to the U.N., told the council that the airstrikes have killed and injured hundreds of Iranian civilians, which he called a war crime and a crime against humanity. He blasted the U.N. and the Security Council, its most powerful body, for not heeding Tehran’s warnings about the “warmongering statements” by the U.S.

in recent weeks and urged the council to act now. “The issue before the council is straightforward: whether any member state may, including a permanent member of this council, through the use of force, coercion or aggression, determine the political future or system of another state or impose control over its affairs,” Iravani said. During his speech, the Iranian diplomat did not mention or comment on President Donald Trump’s statement that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in the strikes, although Iranian state media later confirmed his death.

The assassination of the second leader of the Islamic Republic, who had no designated successor, raised the prospects of a protracted conflict given Iranian threats of retaliation. Iranian and US ambassadors have tense back-and-forth

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