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| [PHOTO: UNifeed] |
New York: The General Assembly has voted to grant
Palestine non-member observer State status at the United Nations, while
expressing the urgent need for the resumption of negotiations between Israel
and the Palestinians leading to a permanent two-State solution.
The resolution on the status of Palestine in the UN was
adopted by a vote of 138 in favour to nine against with 41 abstentions by the
193-member Assembly.
The President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas,
told the Assembly before the vote that "Palestine comes today to the
General Assembly because it believes in peace and because its people, as proven
in past days, are in desperate need of it."
Abbas said Palestine had come to the UN seeking
international legitimacy, "reaffirming our conviction that the
international community now stands before the last chance to save the two-State
solution."
Israel's Ambassador to the UN, Ron Prosor, said his
delegation could not accept today's resolution.
He pointed out that 65 years ago, when the General
Assembly voted to partition the British Mandate into two States "Israel
accepted this plan; the Palestinians and the Arab nations around us rejected it
and launched a war of annihilation to throw the Jews into the sea."
The Israelis and Palestinians have yet to resume direct negotiations
since talks stalled in September 2010, after Israel refused to extend its
freeze on settlement activity in the occupied Palestinian territory.
In the resolution, the Assembly also voiced the hope that
the Security Council will "consider favourably" the application
submitted in September 2011 by Palestine for full UN membership.
The Palestinian bid for full UN membership stalled last year
when the 15-nation Council, which decides whether or not to recommend admission
by the Assembly, said it had been "unable to make a unanimous
recommendation."
After the vote, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he would
abide by the resolution "and report to this Assembly".
He said his position "has been consistent all
along" in the belief that "the Palestinians have a legitimate right
to their own independent State" and "Israel has the right to live in
peace and security with its neighbours."
He stressed that "there is no substitute for
negotiations to that end."
Ambassador Susan Rice of the United States, which voted
against the resolution, said "today's unfortunate and counterproductive
resolution places further obstacles in the path to peace."
She insisted that "the only way to establish such a
Palestinian State and resolve all permanent status issues is through the
crucial if painful work of direct negotiations between the parties."
Rice stressed that "progress toward a just and lasting
two-State solution cannot be made by pressing a green voting button here in
this hall, nor can passing any resolution create a State where none indeed
exists, or change the reality on the ground."
She added that "today's vote should not be misconstrued
by any as constituting eligibility for UN membership."
Ambassador Gérard Araud of France, who voted in favour of
the resolution, said "as early as 1982, before the Knesset in Jerusalem,
President Mitterrand called for the creation of a Palestinian State."
Since then, he said "France has spared no efforts to
promote this solution."
Araud said today's decision was "part of this history
whereby President Hollande in 2012 has committed himself to support
international recognition of the Palestinian State."
This action comes on the same day that the UN observed
the annual International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People.
Established in 1977, the Day marks the date in 1947 when the Assembly adopted a
resolution partitioning then-mandated Palestine into two States, one Jewish and
one Arab. -UNifeed