UNITED NATIONS (AP) 鈥� In an upcoming report to the U.N. Security Council, the secretary-general of the world body plans to list both that violates the rights and protection of children.
The preface of last year鈥檚 report says it lists parties engaged in 鈥渢he killing and maiming of children, rape and other forms of sexual violence perpetrated against children, attacks on schools, hospitals and protected persons."
The head of Secretary-General Ant贸nio Guterres' office called Israel's U.N. ambassador, Gilad Erdan, on Friday to inform him that Israel would be in the report when it is sent to the council next week, U.N. spokesman St茅phane Dujarric told reporters.
Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad also will be listed.
Israel reacted with outrage, sending news organizations a video of Erdan berating the head of Guterres' office, supposedly on the other end of a phone call.
鈥淗amas will continue even more to use schools and hospitals because this shameful decision of the Secretary-General will only give Hamas hope to survive and extend the war and extend the suffering,鈥� Erdan wrote in a statement. 鈥淪hame on him!鈥�
The move heightened a long-running , with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saying, "The UN put itself on the black list of history today.鈥�
Condemnation of the secretary-general鈥檚 decision appeared to bring together Israel鈥檚 increasingly fractious leadership 鈥� from the right-wing Netanyahu and Erdan to the popular centrist member of the War Cabinet, Benny Gantz.
Gantz cited Israel鈥檚 first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, as saying 鈥渋t matter not what say the goyim (non-Jews), what is important is what do the Jews.鈥�
Meanwhile, the Palestinian U.N. ambassador said that adding Israel to the 鈥溾�榣ist of shame,鈥� will not bring back tens of thousands of our children who were killed by Israel over decades.鈥�
鈥淏ut it is an important step in the right direction,鈥� Riyad Mansour wrote in a statement.
Israel faces heavy over civilian casualties in Gaza and questions about whether it has done enough to prevent them in an eight-month-old war. Two in Gaza killed dozens of civilians.
U.N. agencies warned Wednesday that over 1 million Palestinians in Gaza could experience the highest level of starvation by the middle of next month if hostilities continue.
The World Food Program and the Food and Agriculture Organization said in a joint report that hunger is worsening because of heavy restrictions on humanitarian access and the collapse of the local food system in .
The proportion of Palestinian women and children being killed in appears to have declined sharply, an Associated Press analysis of Gaza Health Ministry data has found, a trend that both coincides with Israel鈥檚 changing battlefield tactics and contradicts the ministry鈥檚 own public statements.
The trend is significant because the death rate for women and children is the best available proxy for civilian casualties in one of the 21st century鈥檚 . In October, when the war began, it was above 60%. For the month of April, it was below 40%.
Yet the shift went unnoticed for months by the U.N. and much of the media, and the Hamas-linked Health Ministry has made no effort to set the record straight.
Michael Weissenstein, The Associated Press
