The UN Basic Meeting has adopted a Palestinian-drafted, non-binding decision demanding Israel finish “its illegal presence within the Occupied Palestinian Territory” inside 12 months.
There have been 124 votes in favour and 14 in opposition to, together with Israel, together with 43 abstentions. As a non-member observer state, Palestine couldn’t vote.
The decision relies on a July advisory opinion from the UN’s highest court docket that stated Israel was occupying the West Financial institution, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip in opposition to worldwide regulation.
The Palestinian ambassador known as the vote a turning level “in our wrestle for freedom and justice”. However his Israeli counterpart denounced it as “diplomatic terrorism”.
Though the Basic Meeting’s resolutions are usually not binding, they carry symbolic and political weight given they replicate the positions of all 193 member states of the UN.
It comes after virtually a yr of conflict in Gaza, which started when Hamas gunmen attacked Israel on 7 October, killing about 1,200 folks and taking 251 others as hostages.
Greater than 41,110 folks have been killed in Gaza since then, in response to the territory’s Hamas-run well being ministry.
There has additionally been a spike in violence within the West Financial institution over the identical interval, during which the UN says greater than 680 Palestinians and 22 Israelis have been killed.
The advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) – which was additionally not legally binding – stated a 15-judge panel had discovered that “Israel’s continued presence within the Occupied Palestinian Territory is illegal” and that the nation was “beneath an obligation to carry to an finish its illegal presence… as quickly as attainable”.
The court docket additionally stated Israel ought to “evacuate all settlers from the Occupied Palestinian Territory” and “make reparation for the harm precipitated to all of the pure or authorized individuals involved”.
Israel has constructed about 160 settlements housing some 700,000 Jews within the West Financial institution and East Jerusalem since 1967. The court docket stated the settlements “have been established and are being maintained in violation of worldwide regulation”, which Israel has constantly disputed.
Israel’s prime minister stated on the time that the court docket had made a “resolution of lies” and insisted that “the Jewish individuals are not occupiers in their very own land”.
Wednesday’s General Assembly resolution welcomed the ICJ’s declaration.
It calls for that Israel “brings to an finish immediately its illegal presence within the Occupied Palestinian Territory… and accomplish that no later than 12 months”, and “comply immediately with all its authorized obligations beneath worldwide regulation”.
The West Financial institution-based Palestinian Authority’s overseas ministry described its passing as a “pivotal and historic second for the Palestinian trigger and worldwide regulation”.
It emphasised that the assist of just about two thirds of UN member states mirrored “a worldwide consensus that the occupation should finish and its crimes should stop”, and that it “reaffirmed the Palestinian folks’s inalienable proper to self-determination”.
Israel’s overseas ministry known as the decision “a distorted resolution that’s disconnected from actuality, encourages terrorism and harms the possibilities for peace”, including: “That is what cynical worldwide politics appears like.”
It stated the decision “bolsters and strengthens the Hamas terrorist organisation” and “sends a message that terrorism pays off and yields worldwide resolutions”. It additionally accused the Palestinian Authority of “conducting a marketing campaign whose purpose is to not resolve the battle however to hurt Israel” and vowed to reply.
The US, which voted in opposition to the decision, warned beforehand that the textual content was “one-sided” and “selectively interprets the substance of the ICJ’s opinion”.
“There is no such thing as a path ahead or hope provided by this decision right now. Its adoption is not going to save Palestinian lives, carry the hostages dwelling, finish Israeli settlements, or reinvigorate the peace course of,” Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield stated.
The UK’s ambassador, Barbara Woodward, defined that it had abstained “not as a result of we don’t assist the central findings of the ICJ’s advisory opinion, however reasonably as a result of the decision doesn’t present ample readability to successfully advance our shared intention of a peace premised on a negotiated two-state answer”.
