UN head pays tribute to staff killed in Gaza as resolution slammed

Secretary-General of the United Nations Antonio Guterres speaks to the press after Security Council adopted resolution on Gaza humanitarian aid at UN Headquarters. Bianca Otero/ZUMA Press Wire/dpa

UN Secretary General António Guterres has paid tribute to the United Nations staff killed in the Gaza war.

“136 of our colleagues in Gaza have been killed in 75 days – something we have never seen in UN history,” Guterres wrote on the online platform X, formerly Twitter, on Saturday. “Most of our staff have been forced from their homes.”

“I pay tribute to them & the thousands of aid workers risking their lives as they support civilians in Gaza,” Guterres wrote.

In another post, Guterres once again criticized Israel’s actions in the conflict. “The way Israel is conducting this offensive is creating massive obstacles to the distribution of humanitarian aid inside Gaza,” he wrote.

In order to effectively bring humanitarian aid to Gaza security and staff who can work in safety are needed, he wrote.

After days of wrangling, the UN Security Council passed a resolution on Friday calling for an increase in humanitarian aid for the 2 million people in the Gaza Strip. However, the demand for an immediate ceasefire is missing from the text. The United States, Israel’s most important supporter in its war against Hamas, abstained from the vote.

The aid organization Doctors Without Borders (MSF) criticized the UN Security Council resolution as completely inadequate.

“This resolution has been watered down to the point that its impact on the lives of civilians in Gaza will be nearly meaningless,” MSF said on Friday following its adoption.

The text falls “painfully short” of what is needed in view of the crisis in the Gaza Strip, which is “an immediate and sustained ceasefire,” said Avril Benoit, MSF executive director in the United States.

Benoit also criticized the working methods of the most powerful UN body, which reached the resolution more than two months after the war began.

“It’s unfathomable that in the midst of an unmitigated humanitarian disaster, where every minute counts, the UN Security Council spent days mired in disagreement over something that should have been established from the start of this crisis: ensuring the rapid flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza, and safe, unhindered delivery of assistance within Gaza,” Benoit said.

The Gaza war was triggered by the worst massacre in Israel’s history, carried out by terrorists from Palestinian militant Hamas movement and other extremist groups in Israel on October 7. Israel responded with massive airstrikes on the Gaza Strip and began a ground offensive at the end of October, with more than 20,000 people said to have been killed so far.

In view of the catastrophic humanitarian situation in the sealed-off coastal area, Israel has recently come under increasing international pressure.

The head of the Cairo-based Arab League, Ahmed Abul Gheit, on Saturday criticized the UN resolution as overdue and inadequate, according to Egyptian media.

Source : Sat 23 December 2023, Ezypt