Palestinians to demand full recognition of ‘State of Palestine’ in upcoming UN session

To further this goal, Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas and other Palestinian representatives have been in contact and raised the subject with world leaders and UN officials. 

By Maurice Hirsch, Adv., Palestinian Media Watch

In preparation for the September gathering of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), the Palestinian leadership is conducting extensive lobbying to achieve full UN recognition for the “State of Palestine.”

Such recognition, would contravene international law, as delineated in the 1934 “Convention on Rights and Duties of States” and would necessitate a positive recommendation of all five of the permanent members of the UN Security Council that would be followed by the approval of two-thirds of the UNGA.

To further this goal, Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas and other Palestinian representatives have been in contact and raised the subject with world leaders and UN officials.

“Permanent Representative of Palestine at the UN in New York Riyad Mansour said that the [PA] leadership is holding contacts at the highest levels led by [PA] President Mahmoud Abbas, in order to demand full membership for the State of Palestine in the UN, and thus to preserve the two-state solution.

In statements to [the official PA] radio [station] The Voice of Palestine today, Thursday [July 28, 2022], Mansour added that the political and diplomatic processes being undertaken by the leadership led by the president are being carried out with heads of state, including US President Joe Biden, French President Emmanuel Macron, King of Jordan Abdullah II, and members of the [UN] Security Council, in order to demand full membership for the State of Palestine…

He explained that the Palestinian demands were presented in the speech of the State of Palestine during the Security Council’s open meeting, and that they are being examined by the council’s members. A response to them will be given soon.” [WAFA, official PA news agency, July 28, 2022]

A week later, the PA official daily updated on the initiative saying that Mansour had met with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and that Guterres had welcomed the move and promised to assist the Palestinians with the relevant actors:

“Permanent Representative of the State of Palestine at the UN Ambassador Riyad Mansour met with UN Secretary-General António Guterres in New York yesterday [Aug. 3, 2022]. Mansour gave the secretary-general a letter from [PA] President Mahmoud Abbas on the recent developments and the meetings with many heads of states. He mentioned Palestine’s initiative – which the president raised during his meetings with US President Joe Biden, French President Emmanuel Macron, Jordanian King Abdullah II, and others – on [giving] full membership to the State of Palestine at the UN, as a just act and in order to save the two-state solution…

The secretary-general welcomed this initiative and promised that he would help vis-à-vis the relevant parties. He expressed a desire to meet with President Abbas during the session of the UN General Assembly.” [Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Aug. 4, 2022]

Hosting a delegation from the US Congress, PA Prime Minister Muhammad Shtayyeh also called on Congress to recognize the “State of Palestine” as a means to express the US belief in a “two-state solution”:

“If the current American administration believes in the two-state solution in the 1967 borders, the most beneficial thing is for it to recognize the State of Palestine and vote in favor of recognizing us as a state with full membership in the UN.” [Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Aug. 3, 2022]

As Palestinian Media Watch exposed, in his speech at last year’s UNGA meeting, Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas demonstrated exactly why he is no partner for peace.

In a long diatribe, Abbas:

• Bemoaned the “catastrophe” of Israel’s creation;
• Rewrote history claiming that the Palestinians had never been presented with “a genuine and serious initiative to achieve peace”;
• Demanded that Israel agree to flood itself with millions of so-called “Palestinian refugees”;
• Whitewashed the PA’s continuous breaches of the Oslo Peace Accords including its terror promotion and terror rewards;
• Invented the occupied “Palestinian territories” (referring to Gaza that Israel captured from Egypt and to Judea and Samaria, that Israel liberated from the illegal Jordanian occupation) that were never under “Palestinian” rule;
• Reiterated that the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) is the “legitimate and sole representative of the Palestinian people”, even though the majority of Palestinians no longer see the PLO as such.

Abbas continued by setting down an ultimatum in which he gave Israel one year to capitulate to all his demands or suffer the consequences:

“To ensure our initiative is not open-ended, we must state that Israel, the occupying Power, has one year to withdraw from the Palestinian territory it occupied in 1967, including East Jerusalem, and we are ready to work throughout this year on the delineation of borders and solving all final status issues under the auspices of the international Quartet and in accordance with United Nations resolutions. If this is not achieved, why maintain recognition of Israel based on the 1967 borders? Why maintain this recognition?”

That year has now passed. During the year, as PMW exposed, Abbas and the PLO did a little more saber rattling about their decision to revoke their recognition of Israel.

Now it appears that Abbas has decided to double down on his goal of inventing the “State of Palestine” by demanding full UN membership.

In 2012, the “State of Palestine” was granted symbolic UN non-member observer state status, joining only the Holy See in holding that unique status. At the time, the PA’s efforts were led by terror-mom Latifa Abu Hmeid, who has five sons serving life sentences for the murder of Israelis and a sixth son who was killed in an attempted arrest, after he too murdered an Israeli.

The only other place in which the “State of Palestine” exists is as a legal fiction in the International Criminal Court as part of its mission to persecute Israel and Israeli officials.

The 1934 Convention on Rights and Duties of States (aka the “Montevideo Convention”) sets out the minimum requirements to achieve statehood.

Since it is clear that the Palestinian entity does not meet the conditions set out in the Montevideo Convention – i.e it does not have a defined territory; it does not have a permanent population; it does not have a government in total control of the territory it claims; and it certainly does not have the capacity to engage in foreign relations – the Palestinian leadership is trying to artificially gain statehood status via the UN.

The problem with the Palestinian approach is that the UN does not possess any authority to recognize the existence of a State. The UN can only admit into its ranks a “state” that already exists.

According to the UN Charter (articles 4, 18 and 27) the UN can only admit a new state if 9 (including all of the 5 permanent members) of the 15 members of the UN Security Council recommend doing so and that recommendation is adopted by two-thirds of the states who are members in the UNGA.

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