Israel calls Guterres 'Hamas supporter' as UN chief tries to rope in Security Council for Gaza ceasefire

The United Nations General Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has been facing backlash from Israel for invoking Article 99 of the UN charter and has been accused of supporting Hamas. Israel’s foreign minister Eli Cohen alleged Guterres’ tenure as head of the United Nations was “a danger to world peace. Cohen’s furious reaction came after Guterres’ letter urging an immediate ceasefire in war between Israel and Hamas and his invocation of a rare clause in the UN charter to urge Security Council intervention. In a post on X, Cohen said the call for ceasefire in the two-month Israel-Hamas war and request to activate Article 99 “constitutes support of the Hamas terrorist organization and an endorsement of the murder of the elderly, the abduction of babies and the rape of women.” “Anyone who supports world peace must support the liberation of Gaza from Hamas,” Cohen added.

In a letter to council’s president, Guterres said he believed the situation in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories “may aggravate existing threats to the maintenance of international peace and security” Guterres also described “appalling human suffering, physical destruction and collective trauma across Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories”. “I am writing under Article 99 of the United Nations Charter to bring to the attention of the Security Council a matter which, in my opinion, may aggravate existing threats to the maintenance of international peace and security,” the letter by the UN Secretary General read. “This is urgent. The civilian population must be spared from greater harm. With a humanitarian ceasefire, the means of survival can be restored, and humanitarian assistance can be delivered in a safe and timely manner across the Gaza Strip,” it further read. What is Article 99 of UN Charter? Article 99 enables the UN Secretary-General to “bring to the attention of the Security Council any matter which in his opinion may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security.” There are five articles in the UN Charter that assigns functions to the Secretary-General, of which Article 99 is the most important in the context of international peace and security. When was Article 99 of UN Charter last invoked? The article has not been used for decades, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said. As per reports, Article 99 has been invoked directly just three times. The last time it was invoked was 34 years ago, in 1989, by Javier Perez de Cuellar regarding the fighting in Lebanon. On several occasions, Article 99 has been invoked implicitly, where UN Secretary Generals in the past have used the language of the Article but haven’t referred to it specifically. With inputs from agencies