With four months left in office, Biden stepped up to the green-marbled lectern at the UN General Assembly with wars in Ukraine, the Gaza Strip and Sudan still raging and likely to outlast his presidency, which ends in January.
He sought to calm tensions as the nearly year-long war between Israel and Palestinian militants Hamas in the besieged Gaza Strip now threatens to engulf Lebanon – where Israel targeted more than a thousand Hezbollah targets on Monday.
“Full-scale war is not in anyone’s interest, even if situation has escalated, a diplomatic solution is still possible,” he told the 193-member UN General Assembly.
To a round of applause, Biden called on Israel and Hamas to finalize the terms of a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal put forward by the US, Qatar and Egypt.
