It's a very gentle warning that patience is not limitless and that all the US has to do to ruin Israel's day is nothing. Don't veto. Don't approve funding increase. Don't expedite a shipment. These are all perks that Netenyahu has taken for granted.
Also, even this gentlest of warnings is still unprecedented. Normally the US gives Israel whatever they want, no questions asked.
And this isn't good enough to make up for all the bullshit, especially banning UNRWA aid for something we know was Israeli propaganda.
Is this better than a veto?
Absolutely.
But it can also be nowhere near close enough to what we should be doing.
I'm not going to pretend this is something to celebrate, especially since it's likey the only reason there was no veto. Was the sustained complaints from voters.
Maybe, just maybe, if enough people keep complaining, Biden will temporarily pause funding the genocide until the day after election day. I don't think we'll get more than that, but I think there's a chance for more than a single abstain vote
Maybe, just maybe, if enough people keep complaining...
This right there is my point. This abstention is unprecedented and has only come about because of the pressure American citizens are putting on the administration.
When this genocidal campaign started, the administration's tone was all in with Israel because that's what it has always been. They didn't even bother to read the room. Then it turned out that a significant number of Americans, including three generations worth of voting age citizens, were not overwhelming in favor of genocide. Go figure. Now the administration is back tracking and taking a different tone. That is all because of those who raised their voice. Keep up the pressure.
EDIT: To be clear, I am not saying that we shouldn't aim high. We absolutely should, but we should also acknowledge our victories.
The UN is a diplomatic platform, that occasionally goes kinetic with peacekeeping or aid missions. The majority of the UN is bureaucrats of various levels, talking to other bureaucrats of various levels, to work together.
The UN is also the world police, but much more like a bounty hunter than a SWAT team. Any enforcement actions taken, are VERY targeted, have very well defined limits and rules, and basically requires a sponsor nation(s) to actually go Do The Thing. Which also requires the UN to agree to all those limits, rules, etc and to agree that enforcement is required.
Very often the UN gets bogged down by geopolitical influence issues, like with Syria in the 2010s. The no-fly zone that kept Gadaffi’s Air Force from stopping the uprising, wasn’t a UN action.