United Nations: The Israel-Palestinian conflict has been repeatedly and deliberately neglected and a solution to it purposely described as elusive, Filippo Grandi, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) lamented at the UN Security Council Tuesday October 31, 2023.
He said instead of finding a just solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict it was ridiculed and cast aside as something not necessary.
“Over many years, including those in which I headed UNRWA, I have observed how solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was always described as ‘elusive’. But it has not been elusive. It has been repeatedly and deliberately neglected, cast aside as something no longer necessary, and almost ridiculed”, he said.
Filippo Grandi was addressing the UNSC Special Meeting called on the request of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and China.
UAE and China called for the emergency meeting of the USNC after Israel expanded its ground operations into Gaza over the weekend after it failed to take any action in its last two meetings on the same matter.
Filippo Grandi also strongly batted for a permanent solution to the Israel-Palestine issues instead of “temporary ceasefire” as being demanded by world leaders.
“Dealing with the chronic resurgence of violence, followed by temporary ceasefires, was deemed more expedient than focusing on a real peace - one able to provide Israelis and Palestinians with the rights, recognition, security, and statehood that they deserve”, he said.
The UNHCR also demanded the end of the Israeli occupation and a just solution to the Middle East conflict.
“I hope that now, amidst the horrors of war, we can at least see how grave a miscalculation that has been. There will be no peace in the region, and in the world, without a just solution to the Israeli and Palestinian conflict, including the end of the Israeli occupation.”
“I hope that the remarks by the Secretary-General here in the Council last week will help everybody reflect on the need to turn this sombre page, difficult as it may be: because it is vital”, Filippo said referring to António Guterres’s address to the UNSC on October 24, 2023.
Opening his address to the UN Security Council (UNSC), Filippo also warned the alarming situation under which the Palestinians, especially the children, are forced to live.
“Over two million Gazans, half of them children, are going through what my colleague Philippe Lazzarini has called “hell on earth”.
“A humanitarian ceasefire coupled of course with substantive delivery of humanitarian aid inside Gaza can at least stop this spiral of death and I hope that you will overcome your divisions and exercise your authority in demanding one – the world is waiting for you to do so”, he said.
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