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UN Security Council to meet on Israel’s strike on Qatar
The Security Council will hold an urgent briefing under the “Situation in the Middle East” agenda item today, September 11, 2025, agencies report.
Indeed, Algeria, Pakistan, and Somalia requested the meeting to discuss the strike that Israel launched yesterday (9 September) against Hamas’ political leadership in Doha, Qatar. The meeting request was supported by France and the UK.
Assistant Secretary-General for the Middle East, Asia and the Pacific Mohamed Khaled Khiari is the anticipated briefer.
Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani is expected to participate in the meeting under rule 37 of the Council’s provisional rules of procedure.
The Israeli strike reportedly targeted top members of Hamas’ political leadership, including chief negotiator Khalil Al-Hayya. At the time of writing, the full impact of the strike remained unclear. Hamas claimed that the attack failed to kill senior officials, while confirming the deaths of five lower-level members, including al-Hayya’s son and his office manager, as well as a Qatari security official.
In remarks delivered yesterday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed that he had authorised the strike, describing it in part as retaliation for the shooting at a bus stop in Jerusalem on Monday (8 September) that killed at least six people and for which Hamas’ military wing had claimed responsibility.
In a 9 September letter to the Security Council (S/2025/563), Permanent Representative of Qatar to the UN Alya Ahmed Saif Al Thani strongly condemned the strike, which she said had targeted residential buildings in Doha, calling it a “blatant violation of all international laws and norms”.
In a statement yesterday, Prime Minister Al Thani described the attack as an act of “state terrorism” that demands “a response from the entire region”. He also noted Qatar’s role as a mediator in ceasefire negotiations between Hamas and Israel—a role it serves alongside Egypt and the US—and stressed that the Hamas members targeted by Israel had been meeting to discuss the latest ceasefire proposal from the US. In this regard, he argued that the strike demonstrated that Israel was negotiating in bad faith.
In an interview on 10 September, Al Thani said regional countries would consider their collective response at an “Arab-Islamic summit”, reportedly scheduled to take place in Doha on 15 September.
The Israeli attack also drew widespread criticism from the international community. Secretary-General António Guterres condemned it as a “flagrant violation” of Qatar’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, adding that “[a]ll parties must work towards achieving a permanent ceasefire, not destroying it”.
The attack was similarly denounced by many other international actors, including regional states as well as Security Council members Algeria, France, Pakistan, and the UK, among others. The US reaction reflected the country’s ties to both parties, as the administration of President Donald Trump has allied itself closely with Netanyahu and generally supports Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, but is also a close ally of Qatar, which hosts a US military base with about 10,000 personnel.
In a social media post, Trump said that while targeting Hamas was “a worthy goal”, the strike did not advance Israeli or American objectives, and he stressed that the US did not participate in the operation.
At tomorrow’s meeting, many speakers are likely to reiterate these respective messages.
Some Council members may also note that Israel’s strike is the latest in a series of attacks that the country has launched against targets across the region. These include Hezbollah in Lebanon; the Houthis in Yemen; Hezbollah, Iranian, and government-linked sites in Syria; and nuclear facilities, nuclear scientists, and military commanders in Iran. While Israel has claimed that these actions have been in self-defence, some members may dispute that characterisation and criticise the operations as a pattern of behaviour threatening the sovereignty of countries in the region and showing disregard for international law.
Many members are also expected to repeat calls for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, stressing the ongoing fighting there as a root cause of regional instability.
The latest ceasefire framework proposed by the US earlier this week would reportedly see the parties agree to a 60-day truce, with Hamas releasing the approximately 50 hostages it is still holding during the first two days in exchange for the release of Palestinian detainees in Israel and a surge in humanitarian aid to Gaza.
During the 60-day period, the parties would begin discussions on the terms of a permanent ceasefire, with the US guaranteeing that both parties engage in good-faith negotiations.
The modalities for those negotiations have been a sticking point in the talks since the previous ceasefire fell apart in March, when Israel refused to participate in discussions on a lasting end to the war.
In May, US Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff proposed a framework under which Hamas would release half of the remaining hostages in phases while the parties continued negotiations on a permanent ceasefire; Israel accepted that framework at the time, but Hamas rejected it for not providing strong enough guarantees that Israel would continue the talks.
Those positions appeared to reverse last month, when Hamas reportedly accepted a proposal put forward by Egyptian and Qatari mediators that was based on Witkoff’s framework, but which Israel rejected, instead insisting on a comprehensive deal that releases all of the hostages at once and sets conditions for a lasting end to the fighting.
On Monday, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar said Israel had accepted the latest US proposal. Qatar had reportedly urged Hamas to also accept it prior to Israel’s strike on the group’s political leadership in Doha.
Some members may also argue that recent developments—including Israel’s latest strike, its escalation of the war in Gaza, and the catastrophic humanitarian situation in the territory—underscore the need for the Council to act to bring an end to the fighting and fulfil its responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security. In this regard, some members may express support for a new draft resolution on the war in Gaza that the Council’s ten elected members (E10) have initiated and which is currently under negotiation.
The US, by contrast, could reiterate its opposition to any Council product that does not call on Hamas to disarm, portraying such efforts as harmful to ongoing diplomatic efforts to end the war.
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