A senior UN official warned on Tuesday that the situation in the Gaza Strip and the occupied West Bank is "steadily worsening" as regional tensions draw global attention elsewhere.
"The tensions and hostilities that have upended the Middle East over the past weeks have shifted attention from the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory," Khaled Khiari, UN Assistant Secretary-General for the Middle East, told the Security Council, adding that "away from the spotlight, the situation in Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, is steadily worsening."
Noting that nearly the entire population of Gaza had been uprooted, Khiari explained that "some 1.8 million people, nearly the entire population of Gaza, are displaced and living in IDP (internally displaced people) camps, and are dependent on aid amid ongoing hostilities, devastated infrastructure and rising public health risks."
While modest improvements in aid delivery had been observed, he warned that Israel's "unpredictable access, limited operational crossings, and restrictions on critical humanitarian items" continued to obstruct the UN's response.
He stressed that plans must be advanced urgently, "not only for humanitarian aid, but also for early recovery and reconstruction."
Khiari pointed to the "increasingly fragile" ceasefire and stressed that civilians continue to "bear the brunt of the ongoing violence."
In the occupied West Bank, he reported a surge in illegal Israeli settlement expansion, with the Israeli Cabinet approving 34 settlements in a single March 25 decision, "the most extensive such approval to date in a single cabinet decision."
Israeli occupier attacks were also escalating, with "entire Palestinian communities now routinely facing lethal violence, vandalism and harassment, often in the presence of Israeli soldiers or with their participation," Khiari told the Council.
He also warned that the Palestinian Authority faces "an existential fiscal crisis that threatens the institutional foundations of a future independent Palestinian State." Economic conditions across the occupied West Bank, he added, "continue to deteriorate."
"There is no military solution to this conflict. Diplomacy is the path toward sustainable peace," said Khiari, stressing that resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict "remains central to achieving durable peace in the region, as it continues to fuel instability across the Middle East."
Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide also addressed the Council as chair of the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee, and supported full economic and political autonomy for Palestinians.
"Efforts must be supported so that full recovery and the aspirations of the Palestinians can move forward," he said.
Noting the "severely constrained" economy of Palestine, Eide said it is mainly due to "Israeli access and movement restrictions, fiscal challenges, limited Palestinian control over natural resources, and a weakened private sector."
He further expressed the "deep concern" of Ad Hoc members about the "growing risks of systemic collapse of the Palestinian institutions and their economy," which he said is also "jeopardizing the pathway through Palestinian self-determination and independent statehood."
