Guterres’s outcry both justified and humiliating

By Hassan Asfour

In a statement no previous United Nations secretary-general has made so forcefully and clearly — and perhaps stronger than any ruler from an Arab country in recent times — António Guterres urged the world not to “fear the retaliatory reactions of Israel, and one should not feel fear of retaliatory vengeance, because whether we act or not” in the face of the unparalleled death unfolding in the Gaza Strip.

Guterres’ remarks in a filmed interview with Agence France-Presse mark a clear turning point, after he recognized an unprecedented international failure to stop a genocidal war and ethnic cleansing, as if it were an exciting football match followed by breaking news, rather than the destruction of lives and the uprooting of people and places.

For the UN secretary-general to urge the world not to fear the Israeli state carries deep humanitarian and political weight. Coming from a figure who has stood firm since the start of the aggressive war, it also contains a measure of “political rebuke” that none of his predecessors dared to hint at openly. Speaking of not fearing a state that disregards humanitarian law is a rare rebuke from someone in his position.

Guterres’ outcry could strongly challenge the current American stance — the sole major patron of the Jewish fascist state — after much of its Western European support has eroded, leaving only pockets of loyalty unlike the position before October 7, even among countries long haunted by World War II narratives whose claims of victimhood are now being exposed as false.

Guterres’ cry on the eve of the UN General Assembly opening is also a call to broader thinking beyond the question of recognizing a Palestinian state at a “two-state solution” conference, important though that is historically. It calls for a set of resolutions concerning the membership of the Jewish fascist state in the world organization and for resort to Chapter VII of the Charter — the only international instrument that has become the decisive power — especially after Arab and Islamic states at the Doha summit limited themselves to “warning” about the dangers of Israel’s war to “peace and stability,” ignoring that they possess all the means to break the backbone of the entity and to impose political outcomes beyond the Arab Peace Initiative of March 2002.

The steps of “not fearing” the usurping Israeli entity, which Guterres did not enumerate, would not stop at expulsion from the UN or resorting to Chapter VII. They would open the door to designating it as a state practicing racial discrimination and ethnic cleansing — as was the case with apartheid South Africa — and there are established positions that need only reinforcement, including designating the Zionist movement as racist and taking the practical measures that follow, especially comprehensive boycott measures, including official Arab boycotts and withdrawal or suspension of all investments, which has become the most urgent issue now that the head of the ruling fascist clique, Netanyahu, has revealed both isolation and an economic crisis.

Alongside forceful steps to accelerate International Criminal Court procedures and international justice against the state of mass extermination and ethnic cleansing and its political and security leaders.

Guterres’ cry demands that Arab states, before Western ones, place the United States before a specific responsibility: either stop the war or cease relations with it — an equation that may be beyond the capacity of regimes still unable to grasp that their levers of power far outweigh those of the enemy state, but which will remain a broad popular appeal.

Guterres’ cry urges the Palestinian wherever he is — under imminent death or awaiting it within the remnants of his homeland and abroad — to carve the name of this Portuguese man in letters that will stick in the national memory.

Note: The General Assembly voted to hear Abbas’s speech by videoconference after the Americans refused his in-person attendance — an acceptable alternative step. What is unacceptable is any official Palestinian welcome of that decision. The proper stance is to continue denouncing the ban because it is a right, not a gift. A little self-respect, you buffoons.

Special note: A few days ago Germany said it would support the Palestinian Authority’s budget by several million. Immediately some members of the Bundestag said not a penny — they said they fear it will go to fund resistance against the Jewish state. The problem is not the refusal; the problem is how they revealed how clueless they are. They do not realize that the Authority and its security apparatus are more cautious than even Ben-Gvir himself. Find something else.