HAMILTON, Canada

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday told the Security Council that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is in one of its “darkest chapters" as the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip continues to deteriorate.

"We are confronting one of the darkest chapters of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict," Guterres said at a council session on the situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian question, adding: "The Israeli military onslaught in Gaza City is compounding an already catastrophic humanitarian crisis."

Noting that countless Palestinian civilians and the remaining hostages are trapped under relentless bombardment, deprived of food, water, electricity, and medicine, Guterres said: "Famine is a reality, with the population constantly forced to move and being starved."

"To call this situation untenable and morally and legally indefensible does not begin to capture the scale of human suffering," he added.

Decrying the repeated violations of international law and UN resolutions that continue to be ignored, he stressed that "international humanitarian law is (being) violated. Impunity prevails. And our collective credibility is being undermined."

Guterres highlighted the regional implications of the conflict, noting that Israeli violence is spreading "from Gaza into the occupied West Bank, and beyond, including several countries in the region, and recently even Qatar."  

‘Viability of 2-state solution eroding’

He denounced the Sept. 9 Israeli attack on Qatar, saying it "was not only a violation of Qatar's sovereignty and territorial integrity, it also threatened the very norms and mechanisms we rely on for diplomacy and conflict resolution."

Warning that "the viability of a two-state solution is steadily eroding, now reaching its most critical level in more than a generation," he decried Israel’s relentless expansion of illegal settlements, de facto annexation, forced displacement, and cycles of deadly violence, including by extremist Israeli settlers.

He described Israel's recent approval of settlement construction in the E1 area as "especially alarming," saying: “If implemented, it would sever the occupied West Bank, destroying the territorial contiguity of a Palestinian state."

"Israeli settlements are not just a political issue, they are a flagrant violation of international law," Guterres said.

Stressing that the Palestinian Authority is facing an "existential crisis" due to Israel's "fiscal, political, and institutional pressures," Guterres warned that "Israel's withholding of clearance revenues" is suffocating the Palestinian economy.

The UN chief hailed the recognition of Palestinian statehood by more countries, including France and the UK, calling it "the clearest path to a two-state solution" and urged the international community to "seize this momentum."

He stressed that the "day after" in Gaza must be anchored in international law, reject any form of ethnic cleansing, and have a clear political horizon toward a viable two-state solution.

Guterres also said that "the calls of the International Court of Justice must be heeded, including for Israel to immediately cease settlement activities and end its unlawful presence in the occupied Palestinian territory."