Gaza is not piece of land waiting to be grabbed, says Palestinian UN envoy

Palestinian UN envoy Riyad Mansour said Tuesday that the Gaza Strip is an inseparable part of the occupied Palestinian territory and belongs to the Palestinian people.

"Gaza is not a piece of land that is hanging in the air for anyone to grab. It belongs to its people. It belongs to the Palestinian people," Mansour said at the opening session of the UN Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People.

Mansour welcomed the Gaza ceasefire and noted the cooperation of all parties involved, including the US, but emphasized that it must be lasting.

Saying that the ceasefire must "not be fragile," he said, "Israel should not continue to go and kill our people as they wish in the Gaza Strip and other parts of the occupied Palestinian territory."

He stressed the importance of humanitarian access. "Humanitarian assistance has to be allowed to reach all corners of the Gaza Strip," and "humanitarians, including the United Nations, including UNRWA (UN Palestinian refugee agency), should be allowed to continue carrying their mandates and their responsibilities."

"We want to see the beginning of the withdrawal of the Israeli forces to be out completely of the Gaza Strip," he said, welcoming the move into the second phase of the ceasefire that was signed in late October.

He reaffirmed that the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza "constitute a single territorial unit" that must be unified under the Palestinian Authority, and stressed that Israel "must fully and without delay, withdraw from the Gaza Strip," calling it essential for any international stabilization effort.