The upcoming inclusion of Israel on a UN list of countries and armed forces determined to be failing to protect children in war prompted a furious Israeli response Friday.
The annual “Children and Armed Conflict” report from UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is not due to be published until June 18, but Israel’s UN ambassador, Gilad Erdan, spoke out after receiving private notification of the inclusion. “I am utterly shocked and disgusted by this shameful decision,” Erdan said in a statement.
In a recent tweet Antonio mentioned the suffering of the people of Israel. “I remain gravely concerned about the exchanges of fire across the Blue Line, which have impacted both Lebanon and Israel and could trigger a broader conflict with devastating consequences for the region”, wrote Antonio Guterres on X.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu posted on his X social media account that the UN “put itself today on history’s blacklist when it adopted the absurd claims of Hamas. The IDF is the most moral military in the world and no ‘flat earth’ decision by the UN secretary-general can change that,” he wrote, referring to the Israel Defense Forces.
The Palestinian envoy to the United Nations, Riyad Mansour, said adding Israel to the “list of shame” would not restore the lives of children killed or left permanently disabled in Israeli military attacks.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 36,731 people in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry. Of those, some 15,000 have been minors, according to Gaza’s government press office.
Israel has also delayed the entry of aid into Gaza, depriving the territory’s 2.4 million people of clean water, food, medicines and fuel.
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