He triggered Article 99, prompting a UN Security Council vote on Friday, because he believes this is a very urgent matter which must be brought to the attention of the council.

The Israeli government detests the UN and they detest the secretary general.

The Israelis rejected his description, claiming Mr Guterres is in fact the threat to world peace because he is pandering to Hamas by trying to end the fighting now, before their mission to destroy the group has been concluded.

That ill-feeling will not have improved after the secretary general also mentioned that one of the risks is that the situation in Gaza could get so bad that there would be a mass displacement of Palestinians over the border into Egypt – which is also of huge concern to the Egyptian government.

There was, Mr Guterres said, a high risk of the “total collapse of the humanitarian support system in Gaza”. And the Palestinians say that is exactly what Israel wants because it wants to get all Palestinians out of Gaza.

Journalists are not permitted by Israel to enter Gaza so I can’t report from there myself, but what the secretary general is saying sounds pretty accurate from the pictures and video we can see and the people we speak to.

By all the measures you can think of, the situation there for civilians is absolutely catastrophic, as they are subjected to a remorseless military campaign. Israel says they are doing what they can to save civilian lives but insists Hamas holds responsibility for using them as human shields.

At the UN, the Americans duly vetoed this resolution calling for a ceasefire. For those concerned about the significant loss of life, that does sound a bit hollow – the Americans claim the Israelis are saying they will stick to the rules of war and avoid unnecessary civilian deaths. But, they say, there is a gap between what Israel says and what it does.