UN Secretary-General António Guterres said on Friday that the continued expansion of Israeli settlements represents an "existential threat to the possibility of establishing an independent Palestinian state."

This was stated by the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process (ad interim), Sigrid Kaag, during her briefing to the UN Security Council on the implementation of Resolution 2334, which called on Israel to immediately cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory.

Kach explained that Guterres stressed that Palestinians are "increasingly confined to shrinking and disconnected areas, dramatically altering the landscape and demographic composition of the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem," according to the United Nations.

She said that Guterres believes that the continued expansion of Israeli settlements represents "an existential threat to the possibility of establishing a contiguous, independent, and viable Palestinian state."

Kach noted that between December 7, 2024, and March 13, 2025, settlement activity continued at a high rate, with Israel advancing or approving approximately 10,600 settlement units in the occupied West Bank, including 4,920 units in East Jerusalem.

Meanwhile, Israeli authorities demolished, seized, sealed, or forced people to demolish 460 Palestinian structures, displacing 576 people, half of them children, according to the United Nations.

The Security Council adopted Resolution 2334 in 2016, which, among other things, calls for immediate steps to prevent violence against civilians, refrain from provocative actions and inflammatory rhetoric, and reverse negative trends that threaten the two-state solution.

Kach expressed her sorrow over the death of a UN employee in an attack on a UN site in Gaza two days ago, which also injured five other employees.

She also expressed "deep concern over the resumption of hostilities in Gaza this week, which has claimed the lives of hundreds of Palestinians, most of them women and children."

The Secretary-General reiterated his call for the resumption of serious ceasefire negotiations, unhindered humanitarian access, and the "immediate and unconditional" release of the remaining hostages.

On Wednesday, the head of the United Nations Office for Project Services, Jorge Moreira da Silva, announced the death of a UN employee and the injury of five others in an airstrike on Gaza.

Since Tuesday dawn, Israel has resumed its genocidal war on the Gaza Strip, reneging on the 58-day ceasefire and prisoner exchange agreement with Hamas that began on January 19, 2025. Tel Aviv then announced the commencement of ground operations in the Strip, as if to reset the situation to square one.

The Israeli army intensified its genocidal crimes with violent airstrikes targeting civilians, resulting in "591 martyrs and 1,042 wounded, 70 percent of whom were children, women, and the elderly," according to a statement from the government media office in Gaza.

With full American support, Israel has been committing genocide in Gaza since October 7, 2023, leaving more than 162,000 Palestinians dead and wounded, most of them children and women, and more than 14,000 missing.