Statement by the Permanent Representative of Brazil to the United Nations, Ambassador Sérgio França Danese, at UNSC Open Debateon the Situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian question
July 17th, 2024
Mr. President,
I thank the Ministers, other high level officials and the briefers for their important contributions to this debate.
The humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza is unspeakable and must end. For the past nine months, we have come here and tried to put into words our deepest concerns over the situation of civilians, mostly children and women, and condemned the acts resulting in such incommensurable suffering.
Brazil reiterates its calls for an immediate and permanent ceasefire, the immediate and unconditional release of hostages, and the unimpeded provision of humanitarian aid at scale. But we have to do more.
It’s not just military action that is destroying lives in the Gaza Strip at an incredible pace. It is also our inaction, our failure.
The failure to enforce responsibilities for noncompliance. The failure to stop the flow of weapons used to commit internationally wrongful and illegal acts. The failure to attach consequences to breaches of international humanitarian law and human rights law. And finally, the failure to realize the legitimate right of the Palestinian people to self-determination and statehood.
The situation in Gaza cannot be dissociated from the rest of the Occupied Palestinian Territory. Our leniency, over the years, towards practices that are tantamount to annexation by the Occupying Power has contributed to the latest human carnage. Violence now risks expanding along the “Blue Line” and beyond, without regard for security council resolutions.
The provisional measures of the International Court of Justice have denoted that, in Gaza, military action underway could plausibly bring about the total or partial destruction of Palestinians lives.
With knowledge of that unspeakable reality, we should feel compelled to exercise our duty not only to condemn, but also to take effective action, including by abstaining to provide military support in a situation where there is reasonable ground to believe that also war crimes and crimes against humanity are being committed.
We shall not condone, or be indifferent to the holding of hostages, nor to attacks against humanitarian actors and civilians, especially if they are simply waiting in line for aid. All such crimes must be investigated and punished.
And we shall enable humanitarian assistance to sustainably reach Palestinians, to address the adverse conditions of life they face.
UNRWA has a critical and irreplaceable role there. We must support it in all of its multidimensional actions, especially in providing education to Palestinian children, who are the main victims of a conflict that has been destroying their past, present, and future.
Mr. President,
The wider Israeli-Palestinian conflict will only cease with an end to occupation. We cannot envisage any comprehensive and sustainable peace in the whole Middle East while the occupation persists. The admission of Palestine as a full member of the United Nations will bring us closer to that goal, by making it clear that Israel cannot determine the fate of Palestine’s sovereignty and statehood, and that United Nations resolutions on the peaceful settlement of the conflict do matter and must be implemented.
That this message has not been clearly conveyed so far constitutes the backdrop against which five illegal settlements in the West Bank were recently approved under Israeli law, in alleged retaliation against the decision by five countries to recognize Palestine. That is a complete reversal of principles.
We commend those five countries for exercising their right to recognize Palestine, and encourage others to do the same. Like more than 140 countries, Brazil recognizes the State of Palestine since 2010. A move in that direction by the few countries that have yet to do so would be especially important now, when a number of actions by the Israeli government threatens the viability of the two-state solution.
As members of the United Nations, it is incumbent on us all to uphold the organization’s promise to end all cases of colonial domination and alien subjugation. In the Middle East, that can and should be done through actions in support of the rightful existence of an independent and viable State of Palestine, living side by side with Israel, in peace and security, within the 1967 borders, which include the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, with East Jerusalem as its capital.
Thank you.
