UNITED NATIONS: Pakistan has strongly urged the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to end its silence and take decisive action to restore peace in Gaza, warning that continued inaction has enabled “mass carnage” of Palestinians.
Speaking at a Council debate on the Middle East, Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador Asim Iftikhar Ahmad, criticized those “shielding Israel” from accountability, saying their policies had emboldened the occupying power to commit atrocities with impunity.
“The occupying power’s apologists must introspect and assess the consequences of their policies,” the envoy told the 15-member body. “What else is complicity? In fact, impunity has become Israel’s shield – and this Council’s silence, its enabler.”
Ambassador Ahmad stressed that the UNSC must act now under its Charter responsibility for maintaining international peace and security. Recalling the recent resolution adopted by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), he urged the Council to act under Chapter VII to halt Israel’s aggression.
Citing the killing of more than 62,000 Palestinians – mostly women and children – he described the situation as “mass carnage, not collateral damage,” and accused Israel of carrying out a campaign of ethnic cleansing.
He condemned Israel’s planned full occupation of Gaza City as a blueprint for humanitarian disaster that could displace up to one million people. “The combined effect of mass killing, displacement, famine, settlements, and destruction of land leaves no ambiguity,” he said.
Earlier in the session, senior UN officials painted a grim picture, confirming famine in Gaza with over half a million people facing starvation, 132,000 children under five at risk of acute malnutrition, and collapsing health and sanitation systems. They also raised alarm over escalating settler violence and displacement threats in the West Bank.
Ambassador Ahmad called on the UNSC to demand an immediate and unconditional ceasefire, the lifting of aid restrictions, release of hostages and Palestinian prisoners, an end to illegal settlement expansion, and the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state with Al-Quds Al-Sharif as its capital.
“Every moment of inaction deepens the suffering and tears apart the very fabric of international law,” he concluded. “The world is watching. History will not forgive delay, nor forget inaction. This Council must act.”
