UNITED NATIONS: UN Secretary General António Guterres, and his human rights chief, urged the international community on Sunday to act promptly to prevent a large-scale Israeli offensive in Rafah.

Failing to do so would have catastrophic consequences for the entire region, they warned.

In Washington, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that the US was still collecting evidence and reviewing allegations that Israel violated US policy and international humanitarian law in Gaza.

The UN warning coincides with a report from its Palestine refugee agency, UNRWA, stating that nearly 300,000 people have fled Rafah in the past week following the Israeli military’s orders for additional evacuations from the area. “There is nowhere safe to go,” the agency warned in a message on X.

At the UN headquarters in New York, the office of the Secretary General’s spokesperson reported that Guterres discussed the Gaza situation with Qatar’s Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani on Saturday evening. They concurred that “a full-scale military operation in Rafah would have catastrophic consequences and must be prevented,” the statement added.

The Secretary General expressed deep appreciation for Qatar’s continued mediation efforts to broker a deal for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the immediate release of prisoners, the spokesperson said.

Mr Guterres also discussed the situation in Gaza on Sunday in Kuwait City with the Emir of Kuwait, Sheikh Meshal Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber.

In a separate comment to the press on Sunday, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, said he was “deeply distressed by the fast deterioration in Gaza as Israeli forces intensify their air strikes” across Gaza.

He also expressed concern about reports of indiscriminate rocket fire from Gaza.

“Where should they go now?” Mr Türk noted that the latest evacuation orders from the Israeli army concern nearly a million people in Rafah. Since the Israeli military issued initial evacuation orders on 6 May, more than 278,000 Gazans have fled Rafah, an area once deemed a safe zone.

“There is no safe place in Gaza,” he said.

“These are exhausted and hungry people, many of whom have already been displaced several times, and do not have good options,” he said.

In Washington, Secretary Blinken told Sunday on CBS news program that “it’s reasonable to assess that in a number of instances Israel has not acted in a manner that is consistent with international humanitarian law.”

Bernie Sanders, an independent senator from Vermont, said during an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday that “any objective observer knows Israel has broken international law, it has broken American law, and in my view Israel should not be receiving another nickel in US military aid.”

Published in Dawn, May 13th, 2024