Jakarta. Foreign Affairs Minister Retno Marsudi will soon fly to New York for the United Nations (UN) Security Council session on the Gaza conflict as the humanitarian pause in the war-torn region has entered its final day.

The UN Security Council is set to hold a high-level debate on the Israel-Hamas war this Wednesday.

Retno and fellow top diplomats from the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) will join the talks. According to Retno, the Muslim-majority nation representatives seek to get the council to do more to stop the war in Gaza. This includes the adoption of a stronger resolution that enables unhindered humanitarian assistance and a permanent ceasefire. 

“We will try to persuade the UN Security Council to do more than what it has done [in the upcoming meeting in New York],” Retno told reporters shortly after a hearing with the House of Representatives in Jakarta on Monday.

The council has adopted the 2712 resolution that led to the four-day humanitarian truce and the release of hostages. However, a temporary truce is not enough to deliver the food and medical supplies that Gaza needs. Today also marks the fourth and final day of the truce. 

The UNRWA -- the UN agency for Palestinian refugees -- reported that Gaza needed approximately 800 trucks loaded with humanitarian assistance every day to meet its needs.

Before the conflict escalated on Oct. 7, only 500 trucks of food and other supplies could enter Gaza. The number of trucks entering Gaza only stood at 100 units on average before the truce came into effect, and rose slightly to 200 during the humanitarian pause, according to Retno.

“Humanitarian assistance is a short-term solution that we have to do now because we are talking about people’s lives here. But in the end, we have to deal with the mammoth task of initiating a peace process… towards a two-state solution based on agreed international parameters,” Retno told the press.

The four-day humanitarian truce came into effect on Nov. 24 at 7 a.m. sharp local time. The truce saw the release of 17 hostages in Gaza, and 39 Palestinians freed from Israel as of Nov. 25, Retno said.

Earlier this month, the fifteen-membered UN Security Council adopted the 2712 Resolution which called for an urgent and extended humanitarian pause in Gaza. It also asked for the unconditional release of hostages. Twelve countries voted in favor, while three of the five permanent members -- Russia, the UK, and the US -- abstained. 

Retno joined an OIC delegation last week to visit UN Security Council permanent members China, Russia, the UK, and France to garner their support for peace in Gaza. The Indonesian diplomat told the House that a meeting between OIC and the US --in its capacity as the council’s permanent member-- was still in discussion.

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