The Israeli government has formally severed all diplomatic relations with the office of United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres. The decision was announced by Israel’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Danny Danon, on Thursday, 28 May 2026. The diplomatic breach follows the United Nations’ inclusion of several Israeli authorities—including the Israeli Prison Service and the military—on its formal “blacklist” of entities accused of committing conflict-related sexual violence.
The punitive listing is featured as an annex to the UN Secretary-General’s annual Report on Conflict-Related Sexual Violence (CRSV). In a video statement published on the social media platform X (formerly Twitter), Ambassador Danon delivered an explicit condemnation of the upcoming publication, stating that the political administration in Jerusalem was entirely “done with this secretary-general”. The Israeli mission further clarified that it will refuse any direct contact or communication with Guterres’s office for the remainder of his tenure, which is scheduled to conclude on 31 December 2026.
Procedural Timelines and Diplomatic Safeguards
The United Nations customarily shares advanced drafts of the CRSV report with relevant member states prior to its official release to allow for formal feedback and verification. The prospect of blacklisting Israel was initially raised in August last year, when a preparatory UN report warned that Israeli military and security personnel were under intense scrutiny following credible reports of abuse against Palestinian detainees in multiple prisons, military bases, and detention centres.
The specific timeline, institutional entities, and official diplomatic positions defining this escalation between the United Nations and the Israeli government are outlined in the table below:
| Technical & Diplomatic Category | Documented Operational Facts | Primary Source Authority |
| UN Administrative Action | Israel added to Conflict-Related Sexual Violence Blacklist | Annex, UN CRSV Annual Report |
| Primary State Entity Named | Israeli Prison Service & Military Authorities | The Jerusalem Post |
| Israeli Retaliation | Complete freeze on communication with UN Chief’s Office | Israeli Mission to the UN |
| Ambassadorial Decree | “We are done with this secretary-general.” | Ambassador Danny Danon (X Video) |
| UN Official Mandate | “For our part, the secretary-general’s door remains open.” | Stéphane Dujarric (UN Spokesperson) |
| Special Rapporteur Assessment | “This decision is long overdue.” | Reem Alsalem (UN Special Rapporteur) |
| Hamas Listing Timeline | Added to the identical CRSV annex in August last year | UN Security Council Registry |
Institutional Protests and Bilateral Disagreements
Ambassador Danon asserted that Israel had engaged transparently with UN representatives over the past year, providing documents, analytical data, and detailed counter-arguments to contest the allegations. He heavily criticized the decision to place Israeli state authorities on the same registry as non-state militant entities, such as Hamas and ISIS, calling it a moral disgrace that strips the organization of its credibility.
“The decision to blacklist Israel and accuse us of using sexual violence as a weapon of war is an outrageous decision,” Ambassador Danon stated. “The secretary-general and his team continue to spread lies against Israel. To put us and Hamas terrorists on the same list, that’s unacceptable.”
Simultaneously, the Israeli Foreign Ministry released a statement describing the designation as “shameful and absurd,” accusing Guterres of trying to create a “fake symmetry” between Israel and Hamas. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Oren Marmorstein characterized the UN as a “politicized and corrupt organization” that has abandoned its founding principles to systematically target the Jewish state as its primary mission.
In response to Jerusalem’s decision to freeze communications, the spokesperson for the UN Secretary-General, Stéphane Dujarric, confirmed that the administration had noted Danon’s video remarks but maintained a neutral diplomatic stance. “For our part, the secretary-general’s door remains open,” Dujarric affirmed to reporters.
Conversely, Reem Alsalem, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls, welcomed the blacklisting, writing on X that the decision was “long overdue.” Alsalem added that documented patterns of systematic sexual violence against Palestinian men, women, and children had been heavily verified by independent bodies, expressing frustration that institutional pressure had delayed Israel’s inclusion in previous cycles of the annual report.