The Security Council scheduled emergency consultations Wednesday night to discuss an Arab request for a legally binding and enforceable UN resolution that would ensure an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.
Egypt's UN Ambassador Maged Abdelaziz said in a letter to the council president that the Arab Group at the UN, which he currently chairs, was seeking an emergency session on "the continued Israeli military aggression" on instructions from Arab League foreign ministers who met in Cairo earlier Wednesday.
Croatia's UN Ambassador Neven Jurica, the council president for December, scheduled emergency consultations at 6 pm (EST.)
In the letter, Abdelaziz said the Arabs want the council "to adopt an enforceable and binding resolution that would ensure immediate ceasefire, cessation of the Israeli military aggression, lifting of the blockade, opening of border crossing points, end of the Israeli policy of collective punishment, providing international protection to the Palestinian people and ensuring calm."
Abdelaziz's letter made no mention of stopping the Hamas rocketing.
The Security Council issued a press statement early Sunday - about 15 hours after Israeli warplanes started raining bombs on Hamas security sites - expressing serious concern at the escalating situation in Gaza and calling on Israel and the Palestinians to immediately halt all violence.
Unlike Security Council resolutions, council press statements are not legally binding.
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