(United Nations) UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Wednesday lambasted Israeli policies in the occupied West Bank as “a stake in the heart” for the two-state solution.
“Recent developments drive a stake through the heart of any prospect of a two-state solution,” Guterres said in a statement read by his chief of staff Courtenay Rattray at a Security Council meeting.
“The geography of the occupied West Bank continues to be altered by Israeli administrative and legal measures. The seizure of large plots of land in strategic areas and changes in planning, land management and governance are expected to accelerate the expansion of settlements significantly,” he lamented, denouncing the extension of “Israeli sovereignty over this occupied territory.”
He also condemned a series of “punitive measures against the Palestinian Authority” and Israel’s legalization of five settlement outposts.
PHOTO YUKI IWAMURA, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres
The outposts, so-called “wildcat” settlements, are built without permission from Israel, which has occupied the West Bank since 1967.
“We must change direction. All settlement activity must cease immediately,” Guterres pleaded, repeating that settlements are “a flagrant violation of international law and a key obstacle to peace.”
Since the start of the war in the Gaza Strip, triggered by the unprecedented attack by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas on Israeli soil on October 7, violence has intensified in the West Bank.
Antonio Guterres reiterated his call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and the unconditional release of all hostages. “The humanitarian situation in Gaza is a moral stain on all of us,” he said.
On October 7, Hamas commandos infiltrated from Gaza into southern Israel launched an attack that killed 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli data.
In response, Israel launched an air and then ground offensive in the devastated and famine-threatened Palestinian territory, which has so far killed 38,794 people, mostly civilians, according to data from the Health Ministry of the Hamas-led Gaza government.