UN chief warns Mideast on brink of ‘full-scale regional conflict’

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday painted a dark picture of the situation in the Middle East, warning that spiraling tensions over the war in Gaza and Iran’s attack on Israel could devolve into a “full-scale regional conflict.”

Guterres also warned that Israel’s military offensive on Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip, in retaliation for their unprecedented October 7 attack on Israel, had created a “humanitarian hellscape” for civilians trapped in the besieged Palestinian territory.