Iranian FM: World facing most ‘shameful moral’ crisis in Gaza
Security Council inaction on Gaza, Ukraine could ‘fatally’ hurt its authority: UN chief
Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian described Israel’s atrocities in the Gaza Strip as the most shameful moral and humanitarian crisis in history, saying that the regime should be held accountable for its crimes.
Addressing the 55th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in the Swiss city of Geneva on Monday, he said the realization of the human rights goals in the international arena is facing serious challenges, including systematic and widespread killing of humans by the world’s only apartheid regime, Israel.
Amir-Abdollahian said the world is facing the most shameful moral and humanitarian crisis that is because of 75 years of support and negligence towards the colonial occupation and the continuous violation of the Palestinians’ right to self-determination.
The Iranian diplomat said that during the past 140 days, more than 100,000 people have been killed, injured, or buried under the rubble due to Israel’s strikes on Gaza, and those who are still alive are at risk of imminent death from hunger and infectious diseases in Gaza and the West Bank.
Amir-Abdollahian underlined that the world should not let genocide and committing heinous crimes become a matter of routine.
He added that, today, the world is witnessing the unwavering support of the US and its allies for the regime.
Amir-Abdollahian said that the UN Human Rights Council must hold Israel and its allies accountable for the regime’s crimes against humanity.
The Iranian diplomat also held a meeting with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on the sidelines on the conference.
Famine in Gaza
Amir-Abdollahian pointed to the humanitarian crisis in the north of the Gaza Strip, saying that the Israeli regime has killed thousands of Palestinians with bombs, and now wants to kill the remaining Palestinians by starvation.
The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) Philippe Lazzarini on Sunday warned that famine is stalking Gaza as aid agencies struggle to deliver food to the north of the territory. Aid agencies say that Israel has been delaying deliveries.
Israel also plans to launch a ground invasion on Gaza’s southern city of Rafah, where 1.4 million Palestinians live in crowded shelters near the Egyptian border.
Speaking before the UN Human Rights Council, Guterres said that Rafah is “the core of the humanitarian aid operation” in besieged Gaza.
A full-scale Israeli military operation in Rafah would deliver a death blow to aid programs in Gaza, the UN chief warned.
Deadlock in UNSC on wars
The UN chief also warned Monday that deadlock in the organization’s Security Council on the wars in Gaza and Ukraine risked “fatally” undermining its authority, stressing the need for “serious reform”.
In another shock impact of the almost five-month-old war, Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh in the occupied West Bank handed in his government’s resignation to the head of the Palestinian Authority, President Mahmoud Abbas.
Shtayyeh cited “developments related to the aggression against the Gaza Strip and the escalation in the West Bank and Jerusalem [Al-Quds]” where deadly violence has surged amid the Gaza war.
Shtayyeh in brief comments cited “the new reality in the Gaza Strip” and urged inter-Palestinian consensus and the “extension of the Authority’s rule over the entire land of Palestine”.
Israel’s war on Gaza has so far killed at least 29,692 people, mostly women and children.