Palestinian envoy to UN blames Israel for 'engineered starvation' in Gaza

Palestine's UN envoy Riyad Mansour accused Israel on Tuesday of deliberately using starvation as a weapon in Gaza by systematically blocking humanitarian aid and manipulating its distribution.

"Israel has been openly and brazenly blocking humanitarian aid for over two months now. This is engineered starvation," Mansour told a UN Security Council meeting on the situation in Gaza.

He warned that the Israeli plan for distributing humanitarian aid is "just a continuation of the weaponization of aid" and stressed that it is "rejected by all UN agencies and all humanitarian organizations."

"That plan has been rejected…as it is just a continuation of the weaponization of aid by driving desperate civilians and humanitarians into militarized zones to receive or distribute aid at the peril of their lives, by counting calories, by denying aid to many, often the most vulnerable, and by further subjugating the population and entrenching forcible displacement," he said.

Emphasizing that the sole reason behind the dire humanitarian conditions is Israel's policies, Mansour said that "any relief scheme needs to adhere to the humanitarian principles of humanity, impartiality, independence and neutrality."

"The only reason behind the horrific humanitarian situation is Israel's persistent denial and blocking of aid," he added.

Urging urgent international action to break the siege on the enclave, he said: "We call on the States represented around this table, on the Security Council as a body, on the General Assembly and on all States represented within these United Nations to consider as a matter of urgency all possible steps -- all possible steps, barring none -- to break this inhumane siege imposed over two million people and to end this violent, forced famine."

"This cannot be left to the whims of an Israeli government obsessed with dispossessing and displacing and destroying our people," he said, urging to "find a way forward in the next few days if this situation persists to save the millions of lives that hang in the balance."