International Delegations Walk Out During Netanyahu's UN Speech

Most international delegations walked out of the United Nations General Assembly hall in New York as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu began his address, TRT Arabi reported, leaving much of the chamber empty as he started to speak.

The protest follows a similar scene at the Assembly's 80th session in September 2025. Then, dozens of diplomats left the hall when Netanyahu took the podium, while a smaller group of supporters in the gallery applauded him. That walkout came as the war on Gaza approached its second anniversary, after tens of thousands of Palestinians had been killed and a UN-backed hunger monitor had confirmed famine conditions in parts of the Strip.

Netanyahu's appearances in New York are also shaped by the International Criminal Court's arrest warrant, issued in November 2024, which accuses him of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza. The warrant restricts his travel to many of the court's member states.

The issue has direct weight for Qatar. On 9 September 2025, Israel carried out an airstrike on Doha that targeted Hamas negotiators while they were discussing a US ceasefire proposal. Qatar condemned the strike as a flagrant violation of its sovereignty, and Arab and Islamic leaders met in Doha days later in an emergency summit to show solidarity. Qatar kept up its mediation alongside Egypt and the United States, and that effort helped produce the Gaza ceasefire agreed in October 2025.

Qatar's position has not changed: Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory is unlawful under international law, and the war on Gaza must end with a sovereign Palestinian state.