What to know from the UN: Netanyahu says no cease-fire, but other countries keep asking

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — After a day filled with hopes of a cease-fire between Lebanon and Israel, the U.N. General Assembly meeting Friday was a harsh reality check.

Israeli Prime Minister BENJAMIN NETANYAHU shut down the idea in a morning speech that he said he didn’t initially intend to make. He said he had not planned to come to the meeting this year, because his country is at war, but “after I heard the lies and slanders leveled at my country by many of the speakers at this podium, I decided to come here and set the record straight.”

The week has been full of speakers calling for a cease-fire in both Lebanon and Gaza, continuing into Friday. But Netanyahu wasn’t swayed. He said his nation will “continue degrading Hezbollah” until achieving its goals along the Lebanon border, and would no longer tolerate daily rocket fire from the area. Shortly after Netanyahu wrapped up his speech, the Israeli military said it carried out a strike on Hezbollah’s headquarters in Beirut, which caused huge blasts in the city.

Here’s your daily guide to what’s going on at the United Nations this week:

From the podium

MORE ANTI-WAR: Calls for Israel to stop its war in Gaza and back off from a growing conflict in Lebanon continued. The two speakers who preceded Netanyahu each made a point of calling out Israel for its actions. “Mr. Netanyahu, stop this war now,” Slovenian Prime Minister ROBERT GOLOB said as he closed his remarks, pounding the podium. And Pakistani Prime Minister SHEHBAZ SHARIF, speaking just before the Israeli leader, declared of Gaza: “This is not just a conflict. This is systematic slaughter of innocent people of Palestine.” He thumped the rostrum to audible applause.

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