Under attack from Israel, UN chief reiterates condemnation of Hamas’s Oct. 7 onslaught

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres “reiterates his total condemnation” of the Hamas terror onslaught on October 7 in a statement issued a month after the massacre, adding that there can be “no justification” for killing civilians and taking 240 people hostage.

Guterres has come under fire from Israeli officials over his criticism of the IDF’s military campaign against Hamas. Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan has repeatedly called on him to resign, accusing him of trying to justify the Hamas attack — something that Guterres has vociferously denied, though he has said the assault “didn’t happen in a vacuum.”

In his statement marking one month since the outbreak of the war, Guterres calls for the immediate and unconditional release of the hostages, as well as for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire.

“The secretary-general remains extremely distressed by the killing of civilians in Gaza and the humanitarian catastrophe that continues to unfold in Gaza, with an unimaginable toll on civilians,” says the statement from Guterres’s spokesperson.