UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told AFP on Monday that nothing can justify Israel’s collective punishment of the people of Gaza as they are enduring “unimaginable” suffering.
Guterres criticised Israel’s handling of the war in the devastated Palestinian territory, now in its second year, as the United Nations prepares to host world leaders from next week.
“It is unimaginable, the level of suffering in Gaza, the level of deaths and destruction, has no parallel in anything I have seen since I became secretary-general,” said Guterres, who has led the troubled international organization since 2017.
He said, “We all condemn the terrorist attacks and hostage-taking carried out by Hamas, which are a complete violation of international humanitarian law.”
“But the truth is that there is no justification for inflicting collective punishment on the Palestinian people, and that is what we are seeing in a dramatic way in Gaza,” he said, condemning widespread massacres and hunger in Gaza.
On October 7, Hamas fighters infiltrated southern Israel from Gaza and unleashed unprecedented violence that left 1,205 people dead, mostly civilians. According to an AFP tally, the dead included hostages.
In response, Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, and whose ground and air strikes have killed 41,226 people, according to the Hamas government’s health ministry.
More than 200 humanitarian workers, mostly United Nations staff, have also been killed.
Guterres said “accountability must be imperative” for all civilian deaths, acknowledging “serious violations” had been committed by both Israel and Hamas.
Against this backdrop, UN leaders have repeatedly called for an immediate ceasefire, but talks overseen by the United States, Egypt and Qatar remain deadlocked, with Israel and Hamas accusing each other of opposing the agreement.
“It is endless,” Guterres said of the talks, adding that reaching an agreement would be “very difficult” but he remained hopeful.
With Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not answering his calls since October, Guterres does not expect any breakthrough during the General Assembly’s high-level week starting on Sunday, when he usually welcomes all heads of state and government.
Guterres ignored this apparent snub, saying, “As far as I understand, it has already been said publicly that he has no intention of asking for any meeting with me. So, of course, the meeting will probably not take place.”
– ‘Very strange’ –
“The important thing is not whether a phone call happened or not, a meeting happened or not – what is important is what happened on the ground. The important thing is the suffering of the people.”
“Importantly, the two-State solution continues to be denied and undermined through various actions on the ground.
“The occupation of land, the evictions, the building of new settlements – all of this is happening illegally and it is in the context of an occupation which is now, in the opinion of the International Court of Justice, itself illegal.”
He also said a proposed monitoring mission he supported to oversee any future ceasefire appeared “impossible”, and not all sides were willing to sign on to it.
UN missions require the consent of host countries.
That is partly why nearly a year ago the Security Council ordered a multinational mission led by Kenya, not the United Nations, to help police in gang-ridden Haiti, where wearing blue helmets is considered abhorrent.
But with only a few hundred police officers deployed and the mission lacking funding, Washington has raised the idea of turning it into a UN mission – something the Security Council can only do at Haiti’s request.
“I find it very odd that it’s so difficult to fund a relatively small police operation in Haiti,” he said.
“I find this absolutely unacceptable.”
Responding to accusations that the United Nations was powerless to prevent conflicts in Gaza, Ukraine and elsewhere, he blamed Member States — particularly the Security Council and its 15 members — for decisions taken or not taken.
He said the Security Council as well as international financial institutions were “outdated, dysfunctional and inappropriate.”
“We’re trying to solve wars, the problem is we don’t have the power, sometimes we don’t even have the resources to do it.”
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)