Palestinians get Arab League boost for UN drive

Palestinians inspect the site where a smuggling tunnel between the Gaza Strip and Egypt The Arab League on Thursday endorsed a Palestinian plan to seek full membership at the United Nations this fall, setting up a likely confrontation with the United States in the UN Security Council, the Associated Press reported.
The Arab Peace Initiative Committee "has decided to submit a call to the member states of the United Nations to recognise a Palestinian state", the league's secretary general, Nabil Arabi, told a news conference after the meeting of the committee in the Qatari capital, according to Agence France-Presse.
The initiative would "move to present a request for full membership of a Palestinian state in the General Assembly and the Security Council", Arabi added.
Arab League foreign ministers meeting Thursday in Doha said they would support the Palestinian bid, AP reported.
The ministers pledged in a statement to “take all necessary measures and rally needed support of all world countries, starting with members of the Security Council, to recognise the state of Palestine... and to win full membership of the United Nations”.
“Comprehensive and just peace with Israel will not be accomplished unless Israel withdraws from all occupied Arab territories,” it said.
The Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported that Minister of Foreign Affairs Nasser Judeh, who participated in Thursday’s meeting, stressed Jordan’s support for the Palestinian people to regain their legitimate rights, foremost of which is their right to establish their own independent sovereign state on their national soil.
Judeh also emphasised that Jordan is committed to the Arab consensus in support of the Palestinian position, including the possibility to go to the UN to break the stalemate surrounding peace efforts.
Addressing the participants, Judeh held the Israeli government responsible for the stalemate facing US and international efforts towards the resumption of serious peace negotiations to arrive at the two-state solution.
He emphasised that the Arabs and the Palestinians accepted US President Barack Obama’s proposal on the resumption of the peace negotiations on the basis of the 1967 borders and that Israel is the side that rejects the American proposal, Petra reported.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said the aim of the Doha meeting, which was attended by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and various Arab foreign ministers, was to “strengthen Arab support for obtaining UN membership for a Palestinian state”, according to AFP.
“We hope the United States will not use its veto against this decision,” AP quoted him as saying.
Speaking from Doha, Erekat said the Arab ministers decided to form two committees - one to work on procedural matters and the second to rally international support for the Palestinians.
The plan for the Palestinians to seek recognition from the UN is opposed by Israel, the United States and some European governments.
But peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians are stalled, with the stalemate increasing Palestinian determination to seek statehood via the UN.
The Palestinians say they will not return to the negotiating table without a freeze on settlement construction and clear parameters for new talks, including that any borders will be based on the lines that existed before the 1967 Six-Day War, with mutually agreed land swaps.
But Israel has rejected any new settlement moratorium, and says setting preconditions for talks prejudges the substance of negotiations.
From THE jORDAN TIMES .