UNITED NATIONS: Pakistan on Monday called on the United Nations Security Council to take decisive action to stop illegal Israeli settlement expansion, annexation, and settler violence in the occupied Palestinian territory, warning that these actions were part of a deliberate effort to entrench the occupation and undermine the prospects for a two-state solution.
Speaking at the Security Council’s meeting on the Situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian Question, Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Asim Iftikhar Ahmad, said the situation in the occupied Palestinian territory remained “dire,” with no signs of improvement.
He stressed that continued settlement activity and violence were worsening the humanitarian crisis and further diminishing hopes for a just and lasting peace.
“The West Bank is witnessing its largest and deadliest wave of settlement expansion and highest sustained levels of settler violence,” he said.
What we are witnessing in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) is not a series of isolated incidents, but a deliberate and systemic pattern. This is an ecosystem of occupation in which settlement expansion, annexation, demolitions, forced evictions, displacement, and… pic.twitter.com/r9PmVxwMtU
— Permanent Mission of Pakistan to the UN (@PakistanUN_NY) June 29, 2026
He stated that the Secretary-General’s report documents that 4,750 housing units were advanced or approved during the reporting period, including 34 settlements approved in a single cabinet decision – the highest to date.
“Israel’s newly launched online land registration platform in Area C systematically facilitates the dispossession of Palestinian property under the guise of bureaucratic procedure,” the diplomat said.
He noted that on June 18th, the Foreign Ministers of the Group of 8 Arab-Islamic countries, of which Pakistan is a member, condemned in the strongest terms the continued and escalating settler violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, including recent attacks on various mosques.
“The Ministers affirmed their total rejection of these deplorable attacks, as well as the continued illegal Israeli measures in the Occupied Palestinian Territory,” he said.
Asim Iftikhar Ahmad stated in Gaza, while the Board of Peace has overseen improvements in humanitarian conditions, the situation remains dire.
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“Widespread hunger, severe shortages of clean water and medical care, inadequate sanitation, and the unchecked spread of disease have left more than 90 percent of the population living in catastrophic conditions. Despite the ceasefire, 981 Palestinians, including women and children, have been killed,” noted the envoy.
He said all these grave developments need to be seen in the context of continuing statements by Israel rejecting the idea of a Palestinian state and hence the two-state solution.
“The Council must, first, compel Israel to immediately and completely cease all settlement activities which constitute a flagrant violation of international law,” the ambassador said.
Asim Iftikhar Ahmad urged the UN Security Council to ensure an immediate halt to all attempts at annexation, home demolitions, forced evictions, and the displacement of Palestinians in the occupied territory.
He stressed that the Palestinian population must be protected from escalating settler violence and called for all those responsible to be held fully accountable. He also urged the Council to reaffirm its unequivocal rejection of any form of forced displacement.
The Pakistani envoy further called on the Security Council to exert pressure on Israel, as the occupying power, to immediately release the Palestinian Authority’s withheld revenues, warning that the continued withholding of funds was deepening the Authority’s fiscal crisis.
He also emphasised the need for the full implementation of the Comprehensive Plan to End the Gaza Conflict and UN Security Council Resolution 2803, saying their effective enforcement was essential to ending the conflict and advancing lasting peace in the region.
“The establishment of an independent, sovereign, and contiguous State of Palestine on pre-1967 borders, with Al-Quds and Al-Sharif as its capital, remains the only guarantee for lasting peace in the region,” he concluded.
