• Calls Gaza crisis ‘genocide in full view of international community’, criticises UN’s inaction
• Proposes six-point plan, including immediate ceasefire, aid access, reconstruction, and two-state solution
• Palestinian envoy highlights starvation deaths of children, mass destruction across occupied territory
• US envoy urges Hamas to accept ceasefire deal; Israeli envoy says no more visas for UN officials
WASHINGTON: Presiding over a charged debate at the UN Security Council on the worsening situation in Gaza, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar warned that the world is witnessing “a genocide in Gaza, in full view of the international community — one that the UN seems unable or unwilling to stop.”
The Security Council session on the Middle East saw urgent calls from many representatives to end the violence and protect civilians trapped in Gaza. The crisis is deepening with growing displacement, food shortages, and widespread destruction.
Senator Dar told the Council that the systematic targeting of hospitals, schools, UN facilities, aid convoys, and refugee camps in Gaza were not accidents but “deliberate acts of collective punishment.”
“The Palestinian question is a litmus test for the credibility of the United Nations, the Security Council and the integrity of the international law,” he said. “Failure to uphold the rights of the Palestinian people will embolden impunity and undermine the legitimacy of the very international order we all claim to uphold.”
Six-point plan
The foreign minister proposed a six-point plan to end the crisis, including: (1) an immediate and unconditional ceasefire; (2) sustained and secure humanitarian access and protection for aid workers; (3) renewed international support for UNRWA; (4) an end to forced displacement and illegal settlements; (5) implementation of an Arab-Islamic-led plan for Gaza’s reconstruction; and (6) a revived political process for a two-state solution based on pre-1967 borders with East Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine.
He welcomed the International Conference on the two-state solution, scheduled for July 28 in Paris and to be co-chaired by Saudi Arabia and France, as a crucial step toward peace.
“Gaza has become graveyards for innocent lives,” he warned, adding: “The Palestinian question is a litmus test for the credibility of the United Nations, the Security Council and the integrity of the international law.”
He emphasised that “failure to uphold the rights of the Palestinian people will embolden impunity and undermine the legitimacy of the very international order we all claim to defend and uphold”.
‘Unimaginable suffering’
Palestinian Permanent Observer Riyad Mansour delivered a searing statement, describing the unimaginable suffering of Palestinians in Gaza. He began by saying: “I speak with a broken heart and a wounded soul.”
He recounted the recent deaths of a four-year-old girl, Razan, and a six-week-old baby, Yousef, who died from starvation, alongside fifteen others, within the past 24 hours. “Children in Gaza are not starving, they are being starved,” he said.
Mr Mansour accused Israel of destroying everything: homes, schools, mosques, churches, hospitals, water networks, roads, infrastructure, cemeteries, and even aid convoys. He said 80 per cent of Gaza’s population has been forcibly displaced and warned that Israel’s end goal was “the destruction of the two million Palestinians remaining in Gaza.” He urged the Security Council to act, warning that “every day you delay action, you sign more death warrants.” He concluded by asking the world: “What would you do if this was your child dying of hunger?”
Israel to turn away UN workers
Israel’s Permanent Representative, Ambassador Danny Danon, defended his government’s actions, announcing that Israel will no longer renew the visas of certain UN humanitarian staff in Gaza. He claimed that hundreds of United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) employees are being vetted for alleged links to Hamas, and that “key personnel” will be denied visa renewals.
Danon said Israel had informed the UN that the head of OCHA’s office in the occupied Palestinian territory must leave by July 29. “Enough with the hypocrisy, enough with the bias, enough with the endless defamation campaign against the State of Israel,” he said.
He dismissed UN casualty figures and statistics on aid delivery as distortions. “Israel is making the Middle East safer for everyone who values peace and calm,” he claimed, adding that “we are doing the work of the United Nations” by dismantling terror networks.
Khaled Khiari, Assistant Secretary-General for the Middle East, Asia and the Pacific, updated the Council on the scale of destruction, reporting nearly 1,900 Palestinians killed since June 30, including nearly 300 while collecting aid. He said Israeli bombardments have damaged or destroyed UN facilities and displaced tens of thousands of civilians. He called Gaza “a nightmare of historic proportions.”
Denmark’s Permanent Representative, Christina Markus Lassen, condemned the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, noting that the population has been squeezed into “less than 14 per cent of the territory.” She warned that for many civilians, “their reality is one of imminent death by hostilities, starvation or disease.”
Russia’s delegate accused the United States of “cowboy diplomacy” and warned that unconditional US support for Israel was blocking peace. He said lasting stability would never be achieved unless Israel accepted the two-state solution and learned to live peacefully with its neighbors.
‘Accept deal on the table’
Meanwhile, Acting US Ambassador to the United Nations Dorothy Shea appealed to the UN Security Council today, insisting that “Hamas must accept the deal on the table”—a ceasefire proposal already agreed upon by Israel. She asserted that any delay risks further suffering for hostages, their families, and civilians in Gaza living under Hamas’s control.
During the session, Shea urged global leaders to apply pressure on Hamas to release the 50 prisoners still held after more than 650 days and to withdraw and disarm from Gaza. “Shielding Hamas from accountability undermines Israel’s security, rewards terrorism, and does nothing to improve the lives of Palestinians,” she declared.
Shea also firmly rejected accusations that Israel’s military actions constitute genocide. “The loss of civilian life in Gaza is tragic, but the responsibility for this rests with Hamas,” she stated. On the subject of Palestinian displacement, she clarified that the US does not support any forced removal of Gazans from their land.
Published in Dawn, July 24th, 2025