Israel announced this Wednesday that it will deny visas to United Nations representatives following statements by UN Secretary General António Guterres, who stated that Hamas’s attack “does not come from nowhere, but from 56 years of occupation” .
The announcement was made by Israel’s Ambassador to the UN, Guilad Erdan, who added that Israel had already begun to adopt this policy and that it had denied a visa to the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, Martin Griffiths.
“It is time to teach senior UN officials a lesson,” Erdan said in an interview with Israeli army radio on Wednesday.
‘The mass murder of Jews committed by Hamas [a 07 deste mês] It was a genocide in its intent and enormously cruel in its form,” said Dani Dayan, president of the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem, while also condemning Guterres’ statements before the UN Security Council.
“Part of the difference regarding the Holocaust is due to the fact that Jews today have a state and an army. We are not defenseless or at the mercy of others,” the head of Yad Vashem added.
For Dayan, “the sincerity of world leaders, intellectuals and influential people” like Guterres is now “being tested.”
Given this fact, the UN Secretary General “failed the test,” Dayan said.
Following the massacres carried out by Hamas militiamen in Israel more than two weeks ago – the deadliest attack in the history of the Jewish State – the Israeli government compared its actions to those of the Islamic State or the Nazi genocide of millions of Jews.
The Israeli government also said Hamas’ actions constituted “the worst mass murder of Jews since the Holocaust.”
However, controversy erupted at the UN General Council on Tuesday when Guterres “unequivocally condemned the heinous and unprecedented acts of terrorism committed by Hamas,” although noting that what had happened had its roots in decades of conflict with the Palestinians.
“Hamas attacks do not take place in a vacuum. The Palestinian people have been subjected to 56 years of suffocating occupation,” Guterres said, comments that sparked intense criticism from the Israeli executive, which is now demanding the resignation of the UN secretary. general.
“Aren’t you ashamed?” said Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen, who attended the UN session and canceled a planned meeting with the secretary general.
Guterres’ comments were also criticized by relatives of hostages from the Islamist group Hamas, who considered them “outrageous.”
“What a shame to give legitimacy to crimes against humanity when it concerns Jews! The statements of the UN Secretary General are outrageous!” the group of about 220 kidnapped families said in a statement.
“Children were burned alive, women were raped and civilians were tortured and murdered in cold blood. All with the aim of destroying all Israelis and Jews in the territory conquered by Hamas,” the families noted.
Other criticisms of Guterres, the former Portuguese Prime Minister, also came from the leader of the Italian far right and Deputy Prime Minister of Italy, Matteo Salvini, who considered them “serious and unacceptable” because, he argued, “there can be no justification for terrorism”.
Further criticism came from the United Kingdom, which through Immigration Secretary Robert Jenrick called on Guterres to “withdraw” his comments, denying that Israel had broken the law in its siege of Gaza.
“The UK does not believe that Israel has broken international law. There is a clear right in international law for a nation to defend itself and that is what Israel is doing,” Jenrick stressed.
Today, Portuguese Foreign Minister João Gomes Cravinho told the Lusa agency that Portugal “understands and follows” Guterres’ position on the Israel-Hamas conflict, which led to the resignation of the UN Secretary General by Tel Aviv.
“We fully understand and support the position of António Guterres, who was unequivocal when he condemned Hamas terrorism, which is absolutely unacceptable. He was absolutely crystal clear in the analysis he made,” said Cravinho, who deplored this controversy between the government of Israel. and the Secretary – UN General.
For the Portuguese government, “there is no way to say that António Guterres in any way excuses terrorism”.
This, the head of Portuguese diplomacy added, “is an absolute mistake that should not go unnoticed.”
Source: DN
