Riyad Mansour

Riyad H. Mansour (born 21 May 1947) is a Palestinian-American diplomat and since 2005 has been the Permanent Observer of Palestine to the United Nations. Previous to Mansour's appointment to Permanent Observer, Mansour served as the Deputy Permanent Observer of Palestine to the United Nations from 1983 to 1994. In 2005, President of the Palestinian National Authority Mahmoud Abbas appointed him to succeed Nasser al-Qudwa as Permanent Observer for Palestine to the UN. Under Mansour, the Permanent Observer Mission of Palestine to the United Nations changed from being an "entity" to being a "non-Member Observer State" on 29 November 2012.

Mansour was born on 21 May 1947 to a refugee family who lived in Ramallah, Palestine. He has a Ph.D in Counselling from the University of Akron, a Master of Science degree in Education Counselling, and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy from Youngstown State University. In 2002, Mansour served as an adjunct professor in the Political Science Department at the University of Central Florida.

In 2015, Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations accused Mansour of spreading a blood libel when he asserted that dead bodies returned by Israel to Palestinian families for burial, "were returned with missing corneas and other organs, further confirming past reports of organ harvesting". However, the secretary-general and the Security Council have not commented on the accusations.