Media reports say UN Secretary-General. António Guterres, told a UN meeting on February 5 that “it is essential to avoid any form of ethnic cleansing” after the US president said he wanted to “own” Gaza and resettle its Palestinian residents elsewhere.
UN News Center says he was addressing the opening of the latest session of the UN Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, which met to elect a new bureau and adopt a program of work for the year.
The UN chief reportedly spoke in the wake of comments made by United States President Donald Trump on Tuesday night in the White House, who suggested the US could “take over” the Gaza Strip, calling on Palestinians living there to leave.
Addressing Committee members, the UN Secretary-General stated that “at its essence, the exercise of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people is about the right of Palestinians to simply live as human beings in their own land.”
He noted, however, that “we have seen the realization of those rights steadily slip farther out of reach” as well as “a chilling, systematic dehumanization and demonization of an entire people.”
UN chief stressed that “of course, nothing justifies the horrific Hamas attacks of October 7” or “what we have seen unfold in Gaza over these last many months.”
He pointed to “the catalogue of destruction and unspeakable horrors”, with nearly 50,000 people reportedly killed, mainly women and children, and most of the civilian infrastructure in Gaza destroyed.
“In the search for solutions, we must not make the problem worse,” he continued.
“It is vital to stay true to the bedrock of international law. It is essential to avoid any form of ethnic cleansing.”
His third and final point called for reaffirming the two-State solution between Israelis and Palestinians.
Prior to the Committee meeting, journalists asked UN Spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric at the noon briefing in New York if the Secretary-General believed the President’s plan amounted to ethnic cleansing: “Any forced displacement of people is tantamount to ethnic cleansing,” he responded.
Meanwhile, The Guardian reports Donald Trump’s proposal for a US takeover of Gaza was met with anger and blunt rejection from regional allies.
According to The Guardian, Saudi Arabia was among the first countries to reject Trump’s project to reimagine Gaza as a real-estate prospect, and perhaps the most consequential.
Jordan’s King Abdullah, who faces a difficult face-to-face meeting with Trump in Washington next week, also rejected “any attempts to annex land and displace the Palestinians”.
It reportedly was not the first time he had made Jordan’s position clear. The country already hosts more than 2.7 million Palestinian refugees and accepting people from Gaza under duress would have a destabilizing effect.
Egypt’s foreign ministry said reconstruction needed to happen “without Palestinians leaving the territory”. It has previously warned any attempt to transfer people out of Gaza to the Sinai would threaten the peace deal.
