Gaza is at breaking point, UN chief warns

Mr Guterres warned that the Gaza Strip is at “a breaking point” and desperate people are at serious risk of starvation

Antonio Guterres said Hamas’s brutality against Israelis on October 7 ‘can never justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people’ (Alamy/PA)

United Nations secretary-general Antonio Guterres has told an emergency meeting of the Security Council that he invoked Article 99 of the UN Charter for the first time since 1971 because “there is a high risk of the total collapse of the humanitarian support system in Gaza”.

That article allows a UN chief to raise threats he sees to international peace and security.