UN warns of ‘calamity’ as Netanyahu pushes for Israel to seize Gaza City

A elder United Nations authoritative has warned the UN Security Council (UNSC) that Israel’s program to prehend Gaza City risked “another calamity” successful the Gaza Strip with far-reaching consequences, arsenic 5 much radical successful Gaza reportedly died from starvation – bringing the wide toll to 217, including 100 children.

UN Assistant Secretary-General for Europe, Central Asia and the Americas Miroslav Jenca connected Sunday told an exigency play gathering that if implemented, the program could effect successful the displacement of each civilians from Gaza City by October 7, 2025, affecting immoderate 800,000 people, galore of them already antecedently displaced.

This “will apt trigger different calamity successful Gaza, reverberating crossed the portion and causing further forced displacement, killings and destruction, compounding the unbearable suffering of the population,” Jenca said.

Palestinian UN Ambassador Riyad Mansour told the UNSC that Israel was aiming for “the demolition of the Palestinian radical done forced transportation and massacres to facilitate its annexation of our land”.

“What volition unit Israel to alteration people is our quality to alteration justified condemnation into conscionable actions … History volition justice america all,” helium said.

Foreign powers, including immoderate of Israel’s allies, person slammed Israel’s plan. The United Kingdom, a adjacent state of Israel which nevertheless pushed for an exigency gathering connected the crisis, warned the Israeli program risked prolonging the conflict.

“It volition lone deepen the suffering of Palestinian civilians successful Gaza. This is not a way to resolution. It is simply a way to much bloodshed,” the British Deputy Ambassador to the UN James Kariuki said.

France’s Deputy Permanent UN Representative Jay Dharmadhikari condemned “in the strongest imaginable terms” the plan, which helium said would person “dramatic humanitarian consequences” for civilians already “living successful horrifying conditions”.

“The images of children dying of hunger oregon civilians being targeted arsenic they tried to find nutrient are unbearable,” Dharmadhikari said, urging Israel to comply with planetary humanitarian law.

The UK, Denmark, France, Greece and  Slovenia issued a associated connection asking Israel “to urgently reverse this determination and not to implement” the plan, saying it violates planetary law.

In a abstracted statement, the overseas ministers of Spain, Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, Norway, Portugal and Slovenia warned that Israel seizing Gaza City would beryllium “a large obstacle to implementing the two-state solution, the lone way towards a comprehensive, conscionable and lasting peace”.

Israel to ‘finish the job’ successful Gaza

Despite the planetary backlash and rumours of dissent from Israeli subject apical brass, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has remained defiant implicit the program to prehend Gaza’s largest municipality centre, which was approved by Israel’s information furniture connected Friday.

“The timeline that we acceptable for the enactment is reasonably quickly,” Netanyahu told a quality league successful Jerusalem connected Sunday. “I don’t privation to speech astir nonstop timetables, but we’re talking successful presumption of a reasonably abbreviated timetable due to the fact that we privation to bring the warfare to an end.”

He said Israel had “no prime but to decorativeness the occupation and implicit the decision of Hamas”, fixed the group’s refusal to laic down its arms. Hamas said it would not disarm unless an autarkic Palestinian authorities was established.

Netanyahu said the subject had been fixed the greenish airy to “dismantle” what helium described arsenic 2 remaining Hamas strongholds: Gaza City successful the northbound and al-Mawasi further to the south.

“This is the champion mode to extremity the warfare and the champion mode to extremity it speedily,” helium said. “We volition bash truthful by archetypal enabling the civilian colonisation to safely permission the combat areas to designated harmless zones.”

While the premier curate stressed that these “safe zones” would beryllium fixed “ample food, water, and aesculapian care”, guards astatine the arguable Israel- and United States-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), purportedly established to present assistance to the starving Palestinian population, person routinely opened fire connected the assistance seekers, sidesplitting dozens astatine a time.

Asked astir the increasing disapproval targeting his cabinet’s decision, Netanyahu said the state was prepared to combat alone. “We volition triumph the war, with oregon without the enactment of others,” helium said.

The United States, a veto-wielding imperishable subordinate of the UNSC, has truthful acold shielded its staunch state from immoderate applicable measures of UN censure. Netanyahu said helium had not yet spoken with US President Donald Trump since Israel’s furniture approved the expanded warfare plan, but intended to bash truthful soon.

‘Unacceptable catastrophe’

The manager of the coordination part astatine the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that the “unacceptable catastrophe” unfolding successful Gaza indispensable beryllium brought to an extremity arsenic helium addressed the UN Security Council via videolink connected Sunday.

Ramesh Rajasingham expressed interest implicit “the prolonged conflict, the reports of atrocities and further quality toll that is apt to unfold pursuing the authorities of Israel’s determination to grow subject operations successful Gaza”.

Israel has blocked each but a trickle of assistance from entering Gaza for months and has prevented UN workers from accessing and distributing lifesaving assistance. “The UN has a program and the systems successful spot to respond. We’ve said this before, and we volition accidental it again and again: Let america work,” Rajasingham said.

The Government Media Office successful Gaza said lone 1,210 assistance trucks person entered Gaza implicit the past 14 days. Officials said this represents conscionable 14 percent of the territory’s minimum existent needs of 8,400 trucks.

Netanyahu acknowledged determination person been issues of “deprivation” successful Gaza, but denied that Israel has a “starvation policy”. Human Rights Watch, among different planetary organisations, has repeatedly called Israel’s usage of starvation of civilians arsenic a limb of warfare a “war crime”.

Ahmad Alhendawi, Save the Children International’s manager for the Middle East, North Africa and Eastern Europe, told Al Jazeera that his squad connected the crushed was seeing an “exponential increase” successful the fig of malnutrition cases, with effects that tin “span generations”.

“This is not 1 event. This is not the lack of 2 oregon 3 meals. This is an accumulation of months [of deprivation],” helium said. “We tin assistance alleviate the suffering of children successful Gaza, but we cannot bash that if the authorities of Israel continues to enforce each its limitations.”