The United Nations General Assembly in New York became the stage this week for a dramatic confrontation of narratives and visions for the future of Israel and Palestine, as Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered starkly opposing speeches on September 25 and 26, 2025. Their remarks, delivered amid the ongoing war in Gaza and renewed international debate over Palestinian statehood, underscored the deep divisions that continue to define the conflict—and the world’s response to it.
Addressing the 80th session of the General Assembly via video link, President Abbas accused Israel of waging "a war of genocide, destruction, starvation and displacement" against Palestinians in Gaza. He declared, "These crimes will be recorded in the pages of international conscience as one of the most horrific chapters of humanitarian tragedy in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries," according to Xinhua. Abbas cited figures from the Gaza Health Ministry, stating that more than 220,000 Palestinians have been killed or injured over the nearly two years since the war escalated in October 2023, with women, children, and the elderly making up most of the casualties.
Abbas painted a grim picture of life in Gaza, asserting that two million people are facing starvation due to an Israeli blockade. He claimed that more than 80% of Gaza’s homes, schools, hospitals, churches, mosques, and infrastructure have been destroyed, and that famine has been declared in the north. "What Israel is carrying out is not merely an aggression, it is a war crime and a crime against humanity," Abbas told world leaders, as reported by Reuters. He called for an immediate and permanent halt to the war, the unconditional entry of humanitarian aid through UN organizations—including UNRWA—the release of all prisoners on both sides, and the withdrawal of Israeli occupation forces.
Abbas also condemned Israel’s continued settlement expansion in the West Bank and what he described as the "Greater Israel" strategy, warning that it threatens to divide the West Bank, isolate Jerusalem, and undermine the two-state solution. He decried attacks on religious sites across Jerusalem, Hebron, and Gaza, including mosques, churches, and cemeteries, and called the Israeli government’s project one of annexation and violation of Jerusalem’s holy sites.
In a notable moment, Abbas rejected the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israeli civilians, saying, "Such acts do not represent the Palestinian people, nor their just struggle for freedom and independence." He pledged that Hamas would have "no role to play in governance" in post-war Gaza and must hand over its weapons. Instead, he offered a vision of Gaza governed by the Palestinian Authority, emphasizing a modern, democratic Palestine based on the rule of law, peaceful transition of power, and respect for human rights, youth, and women’s empowerment.
"Gaza is an integral part of the State of Palestine," Abbas asserted, adding that the Palestinian Authority is ready to assume full responsibility for governance and security there. He announced the formation of a committee to draft a provisional constitution for a modern civil state free of extremism, and described an administrative committee for Gaza, headed by a Palestinian minister, to manage the enclave during a transitional period with Arab and international backing.
Abbas’s speech was also a call to the international community. He lamented that more than 1,000 UN resolutions on Palestine remain unimplemented, despite Palestinian leaders embracing peace agreements and recognizing Israel since the Oslo Accords in 1993. "The time has come for the international community to do right by the Palestinian people, so that they may obtain their legitimate rights, to be free of the occupation and not remain hostage to Israeli politics," he said, according to South China Morning Post. Abbas welcomed a recent high-level conference in New York, co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia, and urged more countries to recognize Palestine and support full UN membership. He expressed readiness to work with the US, Saudi Arabia, France, the United Nations, and others to implement the peace plan adopted at the conference, insisting, "There can be no justice if Palestine is not freed."
As Abbas finished, he sent a message of resilience and hope to Palestinians enduring the war: "No matter how long the suffering lasts, it will not break our will to live and survive. The dawn of freedom will emerge, and the flag of Palestine will fly high in our skies as a symbol of dignity and steadfastness."
Just a day later, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took the General Assembly stage in person, his appearance met by a mass walkout of delegations and cheers from supporters. Netanyahu, who faces an International Criminal Court arrest warrant for alleged war crimes, used his speech to forcefully deny accusations of genocide and the use of starvation as a tactic in Gaza. "Those who peddle the blood libels of genocide against Israel are no better than those who peddled the blood libels against Jews in the Middle Ages," he declared, as reported by AFP.
Netanyahu insisted that Israel was actually feeding the people of Gaza, not starving them. He claimed that Israel has "crushed the bulk" of what he called Hamas’s "terror machine" and vowed to finish the job "as fast as possible." He also celebrated what he described as Israeli strategic victories over the past year, including targeting Iran’s nuclear program and assassinating Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Lebanon.
Netanyahu’s government, however, remains firmly opposed to Palestinian statehood. Before departing for New York, he vowed to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state and has rejected giving the Palestinian Authority any role in post-war Gaza. Some ministers in his government have advocated for annexing the occupied West Bank, where Abbas’s authority administers only small pockets of territory. As Netanyahu spoke, Israeli troops continued to advance further into Gaza City, according to Xinhua.
The dueling speeches highlighted the chasm between Palestinian and Israeli leadership. Abbas positioned the Palestinian Authority as the legitimate and internationally backed partner for peace, seeking to contrast his administration with both Hamas and Israel’s far-right government. Netanyahu, meanwhile, doubled down on security-first policies and dismissed international criticism as unfounded and rooted in historical prejudice.
On the ground, the toll of the war remains staggering. According to the Gaza Health Ministry, Israeli strikes in Gaza have killed more than 65,000 Palestinians and wounded over 167,000 since October 2023, with women and children comprising about half the fatalities. More than 90% of housing in the territory has been destroyed, and nearly the entire population has been displaced. Famine, once a distant fear, is now a declared reality in the north of Gaza.
With world leaders deeply divided and the suffering in Gaza continuing, the path to peace and justice appears as fraught as ever. Yet, as the General Assembly’s session drew to a close, the competing visions of Abbas and Netanyahu left the international community with a stark choice: support for a negotiated two-state solution, or a future defined by continued conflict and occupation.
