{"id":252353,"date":"2021-05-20T18:20:32","date_gmt":"2021-05-20T22:20:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/?post_type=document&p=252353"},"modified":"2021-05-21T18:25:41","modified_gmt":"2021-05-21T22:25:41","slug":"situation-in-gaza-20-may-2021-daily-press-briefing-excerpts","status":"publish","type":"document","link":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/document\/situation-in-gaza-20-may-2021-daily-press-briefing-excerpts\/","title":{"rendered":"Situation in Gaza \u2013 20 May 2021 Daily Press Briefing \u2013 (Excerpts)"},"content":{"rendered":"

20 MAY 2021<\/strong><\/p>\n

The following is a near-verbatim transcript of today\u2019s noon briefing by St\u00e9phane Dujarric, Spokesman for the Secretary-General.<\/p>\n

\/…<\/p>\n

Middle East<\/u><\/p>\n

The Secretary-General this morning\u00a0told the General Assembly<\/a>\u00a0that the past 10\u00a0days have witnessed a dangerous and horrific surge in deadly violence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, particularly Gaza, and in Israel.\u00a0 He\u00a0appealed to all parties to cease hostilities<\/a>, now.\u00a0 And he called repeatedly on all sides for an immediate ceasefire.<\/p>\n

The Secretary-General said the fighting has left thousands of Palestinians homeless, and forced over 50,000\u00a0people to leave their homes and seek shelter in UNRWA (Â鶹APP Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees) schools, as well as mosques, and other places with little access to water, food, hygiene or health services.\u00a0 If there is a hell on earth, he added, it is the lives of children in Gaza today.<\/p>\n

Mr.\u00a0[Ant\u00f3nio] Guterres said the UN will launch a full humanitarian appeal for funding as soon as possible, and that he is also working on releasing funds from the Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF).\u00a0 He added that access for humanitarian goods is paramount.<\/p>\n

A revitalized peace process is the only route to a just and lasting solution, the Secretary-General said.\u00a0 It is imperative that we keep this long-term vision alive.\u00a0 His full remarks were shared with you.<\/p>\n

And a number of you had asked me in this room and online about the work of our Special Coordinator [for the Middle East Peace Process], Tor Wennesland, and in response to those questions I can confirm to you that Mr.\u00a0Wennesland is currently in Qatar as part of our efforts to restore calm in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory, especially Gaza.\u00a0 We are actively engaged with all the relevant parties for an immediate ceasefire.<\/p>\n

For his part, the Secretary-General continues his intensive contacts with the parties and pertinent regional and international stakeholders.\u00a0 He held a group meeting today with Arab ministers to discuss the current situation and he reiterated that we will continue its tireless efforts to bring about a ceasefire, to ensure humanitarian access, and to achieve a political solution that ends the occupation and realizes the two States living side by side in peace and security.\u00a0 The Secretary-General also has a number of bilateral meetings later in the day.<\/p>\n

\/…<\/p>\n

Questions and Answers<\/u><\/p>\n

\/…<\/p>\n

Question<\/u>:\u00a0 Quick question about the Secretary-General\u2019s meetings, bilaterals, with all the foreign ministers who are in town, has he heard about any start-up of the Quartet for negotiations on the Middle East?\u00a0 And has he heard any news that\u2019s being reported about a possibility of a ceasefire on Friday?\u00a0 Thanks.<\/p>\n

Spokesman<\/u>:\u00a0 No, there\u2019s nothing yet to announce on a Quartet meeting.\u00a0 Mr.\u00a0Wennesland remains in touch with his envoy partners.\u00a0 Yes, Abdelhamid?<\/p>\n

Question<\/u>:\u00a0 Thank you, St\u00e9phane.\u00a0 Both the Foreign Minister of Turkey and the Foreign Minister of Pakistan called for protection of the Palestinian people.\u00a0 And if the UN failed to do that, they said it could be a coalition of the willing to send some civilians to be deployed in Palestinian territories to protect the Palestinians.\u00a0 What is your intake or what\u2019s the SG\u2019s point of view on that?<\/p>\n

Spokesman<\/u>:\u00a0 We\u2019ve seen\u2026 I mean, I\u2019m not going to\u2026 I can\u2019t comment in real time on the speeches.\u00a0 For our part, we think the best way to protect civilians immediately would be a halt to the fighting and an immediate ceasefire.<\/p>\n

\/…<\/p>\n

For information media. Not an official record.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

20 MAY 2021 The following is a near-verbatim transcript of today\u2019s noon briefing by St\u00e9phane Dujarric, Spokesman for the Secretary-General. \/… Middle East The Secretary-General this morning\u00a0told the General Assembly\u00a0that the past 10\u00a0days have witnessed a dangerous and horrific surge in deadly violence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, particularly Gaza, and in Israel.\u00a0 He\u00a0appealed to […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":172,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"template":"template-page.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"country":[1035,1182],"document-category":[2573],"document-source":[2329,5352,6169,1817,1877],"committee-meeting":[],"document-subject":[2517,1769,1945,2265,2057,2005,2533,5200,2613,2349,1905,2309,1638,2729,6245,2273],"entity":[1729],"document-language":[],"class_list":["post-252353","document","type-document","status-publish","hentry","country-pakistan","country-turkiye","document-category-highlights-of-the-noon-briefing","document-source-quartet","document-source-secretary-general","document-source-united-nations-department-of-global-communications","document-source-united-nations-relief-and-works-agency-for-palestine-refugees-in-the-near-east-unrwa","document-source-united-nations-special-coordinator-for-the-middle-east-peace-process-unsco","document-subject-access-and-movement","document-subject-armed-conflict","document-subject-assistance","document-subject-ceasefire","document-subject-food","document-subject-gaza-strip","document-subject-health","document-subject-humanitarian-relief","document-subject-internally-displaced-persons","document-subject-living-conditions","document-subject-peace-proposals-and-efforts","document-subject-protection","document-subject-quartet","document-subject-shelter","document-subject-violence","document-subject-water","entity-united-nations-system"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document\/252353","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/document"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/172"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document\/252353\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252353"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"country","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/country?post=252353"},{"taxonomy":"document-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-category?post=252353"},{"taxonomy":"document-source","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-source?post=252353"},{"taxonomy":"committee-meeting","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/committee-meeting?post=252353"},{"taxonomy":"document-subject","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-subject?post=252353"},{"taxonomy":"entity","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/entity?post=252353"},{"taxonomy":"document-language","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-language?post=252353"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}