{"id":247057,"date":"2023-10-30T12:01:41","date_gmt":"2023-10-30T12:01:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=247057"},"modified":"2023-10-29T10:20:06","modified_gmt":"2023-10-29T10:20:06","slug":"the-day-un-secretary-general-antonio-guterres-becomes-relevant-israel-calls-for-his-resignation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2023\/10\/the-day-un-secretary-general-antonio-guterres-becomes-relevant-israel-calls-for-his-resignation\/","title":{"rendered":"The Day UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres Becomes Relevant Israel Calls for His Resignation"},"content":{"rendered":"

27 Oct 2023 – The relevance given to a UN Secretary-General is often judged by the degree of controversy caused. In history, the most relevant are usually targeted. Dag Hammarskj\u00f6ld, refusing to remain a mere bauble of international office, was almost certainly murdered over his intervention in the Congo civil war in 1961. The least relevant (who was that sweet little fella, Ban Ki-Moon?) have barely registered a note of dissent. The big powers like to know they can render such figures impotent, if not insignificant.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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It was, for that reason, refreshing to see the current occupant of that post make the less than startling remark<\/a> that the atrocious attacks of October 7 staged by Hamas and Islamic Jihad on Israeli soil could not be seen as standalone acts of individual, unprovoked outrage. Ant\u00f3nio Guterres was careful to also note that there was \u201cnothing\u201d that could \u201cjustify the deliberate killing, injuring and kidnapping of civilians, or the launching of rockets against civilian targets\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Guterres also noted that it was \u201cimportant to also recognise the attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum.\u201d\u00a0 The Palestinians had \u201cbeen 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.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the attacks by Hamas could not be justified to address such grievances, they also could not be used as a pretext to \u201cjustify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people.\u201d Even war, he explained to his colleagues, had rules.<\/p>\n

The Secretary-General also reiterated the principle of protecting civilians during armed conflict. This precluded using them as human shields and ordering \u201cmore than one million people to evacuate the south, where there is no shelter, no food, no water, no medicine, and no fuel, and then continuing to bomb the south itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Such comments did not go down well with the Israeli Foreign Minister.\u00a0 Bullies of international relations are always easily slighted.\u00a0 And so it was that Eli Cohen<\/strong> would gasp and wonder which world the secretary-general was living in. \u201cDefinitely, this is not our world.\u201d<\/p>\n

The foreign minister made it fairly clear<\/a> what sort of world that was. \u201cI will not meet the UN Secretary-General. After the October 7th<\/sup> massacre, there is no place for a balanced approach. Hamas must be erased off the face of the planet.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gilad Erdan<\/strong>, the Israeli ambassador to the United Nations, spoke in the voice of complacency outraged, going so far as to demand the resignation<\/a> of Guterres.<\/p>\n

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It is a disgrace to the @UN<\/a> that the Secretary-General did not retract his words and is not even able to apologize for what he said yesterday\u2757\ufe0f\u2757\ufe0f<\/p>\n

The Secretary-General, once again, distorts and twists reality. He clearly said yesterday that the massacre by Hamas \u2018did not happen\u2026<\/p>\n

— Ambassador Gilad Erdan \u05d2\u05dc\u05e2\u05d3 \u05d0\u05e8\u05d3\u05df (@giladerdan1) October 25, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n