BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- The President of Argentina wrote to the Union of South American Nations on Wednesday asking them to demand the UN Security Council makes a statement on Israel's eight-day bombardment of Gaza.

President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner said the council should order an end to hostilities, which halted later Wednesday as a truce deal was reached, but also commend President Mahmoud Abbas for his diplomatic efforts for peace.

Abbas will ask the UN General Assembly next week to admit Palestine as a non-member state. The UN bid has been overshadowed by Israel's war on Gaza, which killed 170.

South America's support to the bid "will be a clear message to the Palestinian people and Israel that they can, and must, rely on the international community to achieve a lasting and effective peace," Kirchner wrote, in the letter provided by the Argentinian consulate to the PA.

The Security Council should "express to President Mahmoud Abbas our full support to his intense work to reach peace through dialogue and not violence," she wrote.