NEW YORK — Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar on Tuesday said countries that announced plans to recognize a Palestinian state in recent weeks sabotaged a ceasefire deal with the Hamas terror group.
“There are countries that acted, also in this building, to pressure Israel, instead of Hamas, during sensitive days in the negotiations by attacking Israel, campaigning against Israel, and the announcement of a recognition of a virtual Palestinian state. They gave Hamas free gifts and incentives to continue this war,” Sa’ar said during a press briefing at the United Nations in New York.
“They directly assassinated the hostage deal and ceasefire. Let me be clear: these countries prolonged the war. Hamas is responsible for beginning this war by invading Israel and committing the October 7 atrocities,” Sa’ar said.
“Hamas is also responsible for the continuation of this war by still refusing to release our hostages and lay down its arms. The international pressure must be on Hamas. Anything else only prolongs the war,” he said.
Sa’ar spoke at the UN ahead of a Security Council session focused on the Gaza war. Israel called the UN session after Hamas and its ally Palestinian Islamic Jihad published videos last week showing hostages Rom Braslavski and Evyatar David appearing weak and emaciated, causing deep shock and distress in Israel.
The UK, France, Canada, and several other countries have recently said they will recognize a Palestinian state in the fall, some of them unconditionally and some depending on Israel’s actions in Gaza.
On Saturday, Hamas official Ghazi Hamad lauded international backing for a Palestinian state as an achievement stemming from the October 2023 invasion of Israel.
“The powerful blow that was delivered to Israel on October 7 has yielded three very important historic achievements. First of all, it brought the Palestinian cause back,” Hamad said, according to a translation by the Middle East Media Research Institute monitoring group.
“Why are all these countries recognizing Palestine now? Had any country dared to recognize the state of Palestine prior to October 7? The overall outcome of October 7 forced the world to open its eyes to the Palestinian cause, and to act forcefully in this respect,” Hamad said.
Sa’ar also highlighted the plight of the hostages still held in Gaza.
“This past weekend, the world witnessed the cruel starvation of Evyatar David and Rom Braslavski, tortured deliberately by Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The world saw their terrible condition, bones standing out in their skin, like living skeletons,” Sa’ar said.
“Evyatar was forced to dig his own grave. This is satanic. Hamas and Islamic Jihad used starvation and torture as part of a deliberate and well-planned propaganda campaign, but the truth must be told. Israel is facilitating huge amounts of aid into Gaza. No other country acts this way in war,” he said.
Speaking at the start of the Security Council hearing, David’s brother, Ilay David, said the international body was complicit in the hostages’ plight due to its inaction to secure their release.
“Every moment of delay is a step closer to a final, tragic outcome. We all have responsibility. To the leaders of the world, to every member of this council, and to the global community: your silence in the face of this monstrous cruelty is complicity,” David said via video.
David described his close relationship with his brother, his brother’s love of music, and the family’s anguish in his speech to the Security Council.
Since the release of the video over the weekend, “My father cannot sleep and my mother has not stopped crying,” David said. He added that, according to the testimony of released hostages, Hamas is deliberately starving the hostages as a form of torture, despite the terror group’s members having an ample supply of food.
David called on the international community to demand and take action for the immediate and unconditional release of the hostages, call for humanitarian aid for the hostages, and “recognize that this is a matter of life and death requiring urgent medical intervention.”
“The very soul of humanity is being scarred by Hamas’s barbaric actions. We, the family of Evyatar, refuse to give up hope. We are weeping and suffering but we are also fighting,” David said.
Speaking after David, members of the Security Council acknowledged the hostages’ suffering and called for their release, but mainly focused their criticism on Israel, highlighting the death toll and hunger in Gaza while demanding an immediate end to the war and the establishment of a Palestinian state.
The United States was supportive of Israel and placed blame for the war on Hamas.
“The United States calls upon all countries to join together and say with one clear voice that Hamas must immediately surrender, release all the hostages, both those living and those who have already been murdered at the hands of Hamas, and allow this war to end,” said US representative to the UN Dorothy Shea.
Protesters supporting the hostages gathered outside the UN during the Security Council session.“We saw horrifying images of Rom and Evyatar as if they were taken from the holocaust,” said Moshe Lavi, brother-in-law of hostage Omri Miran, according to a statement from the New York branch of the Hostages and Missing Families Forum.
“We are here to demand immediate action from the UN, to let our people go and to end this nightmare immediately,” Miran said.
The Security Council session came ahead of next month’s annual UN General Assembly meetings. Anti-Israel protesters based in New York are holding regular protests at the UN and at the embassies of Middle East countries ahead of the General Assembly.
The war began with the invasion of southern Israel by thousands of Hamas-led terrorists on October 7, 2023, which saw some 1,200 people killed and 251 taken hostage. Fifty hostages are still held in Gaza, 20 of whom are believed to be alive.