UNITED NATIONS — The UN General Assembly will vote on a Palestinian resolution on Wednesday demands that Israel end its “illegal presence” withdraw military forces from Gaza and the occupied West Bank and evacuate all settlers within a year.
The resolution is put to the vote in the 193-member assembly, while Israel… war against Hamas in Gaza is approaching its first anniversary and as violence in the West Bank reaches new heightsThe war was caused by Hamas attacks in southern Israel on October 7th.
Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian ambassador to the UN, opened the meeting Tuesday, saying Palestinians pose an “existential threat” and claiming Israel is keeping them “in chains.” He demanded an end to Israel’s decades-long occupation and for Palestinians to return home to live in peace and freedom.
Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, urged member states to reject the resolution, which he described as “an attempt to destroy Israel through diplomatic terrorism,” which never mentions Hamas’s atrocities and “ignores the truth, distorts the facts and replaces reality with fiction.”
“Instead of a resolution condemning the rape and massacre by Hamas on October 7, we gather here to watch the Palestinian UN circus – a circus where evil is just, war is peace, murder is justified and terror is cheered,” he said.
If adopted, the resolution will not be legally binding, but the level of support will reflect world opinion. There are no vetoes in the General Assembly, unlike the 15-member Security Council.
The resolution is a response to a ruling by the highest court of the United Nations In July, he said Israel’s presence in the Palestinian territories is illegitimate and must end.
In its blanket condemnation of Israel’s rule over the territories it captured during the 1967 war, the International Court of Justice held that Israel had no right to sovereignty over the Palestinian territories and that it violated international law prohibiting the acquisition of such territories by force.
The court’s opinion is also not legally binding. Nevertheless, the Palestinians drafted the resolution to try to implement the ruling, saying that Israel’s “abuse of its status as an occupying power” makes its “presence in the occupied Palestinian territory unlawful.”
Mansour stressed that any country that thinks the Palestinian people “will accept a life of slavery” or claims that peace is possible without a just solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict “is not realistic.”
The solution remains an independent Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital, living in peace and security alongside Israel, he said.
U.S. Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas Greenfield told reporters the resolution has “a significant number of flaws,” saying it goes beyond the ICJ ruling. It also fails to recognize that “Hamas is a terrorist organization” in control of Gaza and that Israel has the right to defend itself, she said.
“We believe the resolution does not bring tangible benefits to the Palestinian people,” Thomas-Greenfield said. “I think it could complicate the situation on the ground, could complicate what we are trying to do to end the conflict, and I think it could stand in the way of renewed steps toward a two-state solution.”
The resolution calls for reparations to be paid to Palestinians for damages caused by the occupation and urges countries to take measures to prevent trade or investment that sustains Israel’s presence in the territories.
The report also calls for Israel to be held accountable for any violations of international law, for sanctions to be imposed on those responsible for Israel’s presence in the territories, and for countries to halt arms exports to Israel if there is a suspicion that they are being used there.
Mansour said a first Palestinian design demanded that Israel end the occupation within six months, but this was revised following concerns from some countries to extend the deadline to a maximum of one year.
He said that Israel will most likely not pay attention to the resolution.
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