On Tuesday, Israeli Ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan said that UN Secretary-General António Guterres “is not fit to lead the UN,” and should resign immediately. Guterres had made comments before the UN Security Council, which was meeting to discuss the situation in Gaza.
Guterres appeared to blame Israel for the horrific terrorist incident that took place on October 7 when Hamas, which is headquartered in Gaza, killed at least 1,400 people and took more than 200 hostages.
“It is important to also recognize the attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum,” Guterres told the gathering of the Security Council. “The Palestinian people have been subjected to 56 years of suffocating occupation. They have seen their land steadily devoured by settlements and plagued by violence; their economy stifled; their people displaced and their homes demolished. Their hopes for a political solution to their plight have been vanishing.”
Guterres did state that “the grievances of the Palestinian people cannot justify the appalling attacks by Hamas,” before adding, “And those appalling attacks cannot justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”
He went on to say he was “deeply concerned about the clear violations of international humanitarian law that we are witnessing in Gaza.”
The secretary-general then issued a warning to Israel: “Let me be clear: No party to an armed conflict is above international humanitarian law.”
Erdan called Guterres’ comments “shocking,” and went on to demand the secretary-general’s resignation.
“The UN Secretary-General, who shows understanding for the campaign of mass murder of children, women, and the elderly, is not fit to lead the UN. I call on him to resign immediately,” Erdan posted on X. “There is no justification or point in talking to those who show compassion for the most terrible atrocities committed against the citizens of Israel and the Jewish people. There are simply no words.”
“It’s sad that a person with such views is the head of an organization that arose after the Holocaust,” Erdan added. “It’s really unfathomable.”
Guterres, apparently, has no intention of leaving his post, and dismissed the idea that he was siding with Hamas.
“I’m shocked by the misrepresentation by some of my statement yesterday,” he said, going on to say that such charges “are false. The opposite is true.”
Guterres’ denial of favoritism toward Hamas hasn’t convinced Israelis, as Israeli politician Benny Gantz, who recently joined the nation’s war Cabinet, called the head of the UN a “terror apologist.”
“Dark are the days when the United Nations Secretary-General condones terror,” Gantz said.
“Absolutely nothing can justify the slaughter of innocent civilians,” Gantz wrote. “Now is the time to stand on the right side of history, or be judged by it. Terror apologists cannot speak on behalf of the world.”
After the remarks went public, Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen quickly canceled a meeting with Guterres. According to Cohen, “There is no place for an even-handed approach. Hamas needs to be wiped off the face of the earth.”
Tal Heinrich, spokeswoman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told Fox News that Guterres’ remarks were a clear sign of an anti-Israel bias at the UN.
“This is nothing new, this crazy double-standard. What the UN secretary-general said, that this Hamas attack, the massacre of Oct. 7, didn’t come in a ‘vacuum.’ That is mind-boggling,” she said.
“Can you imagine the UN secretary-general saying such a terrible sentence after the 9/11 attack? That the 9/11 attack didn’t come in a vacuum? That the Pearl Harbor attack didn’t come in a vacuum? That the Boko Haram kidnapping of 276 schoolgirls in Nigeria in 2014 didn’t come in a vacuum?” Heinrich asked. “This is insane. This is insanity. The civilized world must stand with Israel in its war against terrorism. The message that a UN secretary-general must send out is that terrorism is a dead end.”
Israel has announced that it will suspend visas to UN officials because of Guterres’ remarks.
Although the UN was created in the ashes of World War II, partially as a response to the Holocaust, the UN has proven that it is not a friend to Israel, issuing more than 140 condemnations of the country since 2015. The total of such condemnations for the rest of the world, even including human-rights abusers such as China and Pakistan, has been only 68.
