UN chief Antonio Guterres hits back at Israel, says ‘cannot justify collective punishment of Palestinian people’

*Stands firm on his remarks over Hamas attack

United Nations chief Antonio Guterres on Wednesday stood firm on his remarks over the Hamas attack. He said those horrendous attacks cannot justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people.

Guterres earlier said the attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum, expressing an understanding of terrorism and murder. “It’s really unfathomable. It’s truly sad that the head of an organization that arose after the Holocaust holds such horrible views. A tragedy!”

In a post on X, Guterres wrote, “The grievances of the Palestinian people cannot justify the horrific attacks by Hamas. Those horrendous attacks cannot justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”

Following this, the Israeli ambassador to the United Nations on Tuesday demanded that Secretary-General Antonio Guterres immediately resign for showing understanding to the mass murder of children, women, and the elderly people of Israel.

“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,” Erdan wrote on the microblogging site.

Erdan further said the UN chief’s remarks on the Israel-Hamas war proved that he is completely disconnected from the reality in Israel and sees the rocket attack launched by Hamas in an immoral manner.

“The shocking speech by the @UN Secretary-General at the Security Council meeting, while rockets are being fired at all of Israel, proved conclusively, beyond any doubt, that the Secretary-General is completely disconnected from the reality in our region and that he views the massacre committed by Nazi Hamas terrorists in a distorted and immoral manner,” he said.

Guterres’s statement provoked Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen to cancel a meeting with him. Cohen gave a speech before the council in which he held up photographs of Israeli children held hostage, who he called innocent “victims of evil.”

He also played an audio recording he said was a Hamas terrorist boasting of killing Israelis, and identified people who were guests in the council chamber as relatives of Israelis killed or taken hostage by Hamas.

The exchange highlighted the tensions that have followed in the wake of the Hamas attacks and Israel’s airstrikes in response, which Palestinian authorities say have killed more than 5,000 people.