United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres attacked Israel on Sunday, saying “terror and hunger plague the people of Gaza” and that only Israel could remove obstacles and provide more aid to the Palestinian enclave.
“Let me be clear. There is no justification for the heinous attacks and hostage-taking carried out by Hamas in Israel on October 7,” the UN chief said on a visit to Cairo to meet with Egyptian officials to push for a six-month peace deal with Israel. Hamas said during a ceasefire in the war.
“But nothing can justify collective punishment of the Palestinian people,” he said.
During a visit to Gaza’s Rafah crossing to Egypt on Saturday, Guterres said it was a “moral outrage” that aid was being blocked from being delivered to Gaza.
“From this intersection, we see the heartbreak and ruthlessness of it all. There is a long line of blocked rescue trucks on one side of the gate, and the long shadow of hunger on the other side.” Guterres said.
He said the only effective and efficient way to deliver heavy goods to Gaza is by road, where commercial shipments are growing exponentially. “The daily violations of Palestinian human dignity are causing a crisis of credibility for the international community,” he said in Egypt.
His comments came as heavy fighting broke out in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, with Israel vowing to continue its ground war near Rafah in the territory’s southernmost tip, despite U.S. objections and ongoing truce talks with Qatar.
But Israel has yet to launch a full-scale offensive in southern Gaza. Several war strategists, including Defense Secretary Yoav Galante, are traveling to Washington this week for discussions as U.S. officials try to prevent further bloodshed in the region, where more than a million Palestinians are housed in makeshift tents Take refuge.
Washington has made clear it will not support an Israeli attack on Rafah without a plan to protect its civilians, but Israel has not yet said where it will move the Palestinians.
Most of the refugees were driven there on orders from Israeli forces, which pushed into northern Gaza in the early stages of the war, demanding they leave their homes in northern Gaza.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed, “We cannot defeat Hamas without entering Rafah and destroying the forces that remain there.”
“I want to do it with the support of the United States, but if we need to we will do it alone,” the Israeli leader told U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken at a meeting in Israel on Friday.
The health ministry in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip said 84 more people were killed in the past day, bringing the total death toll in the war to 32,226, a figure that includes Hamas fighters killed by Israel. The war began when Hamas launched a terrorist attack on Israel on October 7, killing 1,200 people and capturing about 250 hostages, of which about 100 hostages are still being held by militants in Gaza.
Israeli and Hamas negotiators in Qatar have yet to reach a ceasefire agreement.
The U.N. Security Council failed on Friday to call for a ceasefire in Gaza after Russia and China vetoed a U.S.-drafted resolution supporting an end to the fighting. This is the seventh time since the war broke out that the Security Council failed to agree on a ceasefire resolution.
The Security Council is scheduled to vote on an alternative to the ceasefire on Monday morning.
Fighting has raged for nearly a week in and around Gaza City’s Shifa Hospital, Gaza’s largest hospital complex, which has been a refuge for patients and displaced people. Israel says it is also a hideout for Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants. Hamas is a designated terrorist organization by the United States.
In Israel, relatives and supporters of the hostages demonstrated outside the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv on Saturday, demanding greater efforts to bring them home. Some scuffles broke out between demonstrators and police.
This report contains information from The Associated Press, Reuters and AFP.
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