The Arab League Council, which met in Cairo at the level of Arab foreign ministers, called for supporting Palestine’s efforts to obtain full membership in the United Nations, calling on the member states of the Security Council to accept this membership, and calling on the states that have not yet recognized the state of Palestine to recognize it and to adopt and support the right of the State of Palestine to join international organizations and conventions, with the aim of strengthening its legal and international standing to achieve its independence and sovereignty over its occupied land. In its decisions issued at the conclusion of the work of the 160th regular session at the level of foreign ministers, which was held at the headquarters of the Arab League, headed by Morocco in the presence of its secretary-general, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, the Council called on the open-ended Arab Ministerial Committee headed by Saudi Arabia, in its capacity as Chairman of the 32nd session, to continue its work at the international level to support the efforts of the State of Palestine to obtain more recognitions, obtain full membership in the United Nations, hold an international peace conference, and provide international protection for the Palestinian people. The Council also called for launching a constructive dialogue between the League of Arab States and the countries that have not yet recognized the State of Palestine in order to them recognize it as a lever for peace, security and stability based on the two-state solution. The Council also reminded the international community of United Nations General Assembly Resolution No. 181 of 1947, the partition of Palestine resolution, the international community implemented 75 years ago, and whose acceptance and implementation was a condition for accepting Israel’s membership in the United Nations, calling on the international community to link Israel’s membership in the United Nations to the implementation of this resolution. It also condemned the Israeli settlement colonial policies and activities, calling on the UN Security Council to assume its responsibilities towards the actual implementation of its Resolution No. 2334 of 2016, and not to be satisfied with listening to reports of Israeli violations, but rather to work to hold violators of the resolution accountable, to confront and stop the construction and expansion of illegal settlements, the separation wall, racist expansion, the forced displacement of the Palestinian population and the demolition of their property. The Council affirmed that boycotting the Israeli occupation and its colonial regime is one of the effective and legitimate means to resist and end it and achieve peace. It called on all countries, institutions, companies and individuals to stop all forms of dealing with the Israeli colonial occupation system and its settlements that violate international law, including prohibiting the entry of illegal Israeli settlers into their countries, rejecting all attempts to criminalize this boycott and silence people under the pretext of “anti-Semitism.” The Arab League Council urged the International Criminal Court to complete the criminal investigation into the war crimes and crimes against humanity that Israel committed and is committing against the defenseless Palestinian people, including the crimes of settlement and annexation, the aggression against Gaza, the killing of civilians, journalists and paramedics, and the forced displacement of Palestinians from their homes, especially in occupied East Jerusalem and Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron, and to call on the court to provide all human and material capabilities for this investigation and to give it the necessary priority. It urged the UN Secretary-General to include the Israeli occupation government and the Israeli army on the blacklist (list of shame) issued by the United Nations annually for organizations and countries that violate the rights of children in conflict areas, which constitutes a pressure tool to protect the children of Palestine from the systematic Israeli targeting of them with killing, intimidation and destruction of their future. The Council called for supporting Palestinian efforts and endeavors aimed at bringing justice to the Palestinian people as a result of the current and historical injustice that befell them, holding those responsible for all crimes committed against them accountable through international justice mechanisms, calling for the provision of legal advice and technical and financial support needed for these endeavors, calling on the advisory legal committee that was formed in accordance with the decision of the Arab Summit to carry out its tasks in this regard. The Council also called on the United States to work diligently with the parties concerned to implement the two-state solution on the lines of June 4, 1967, and the entitlement of the Palestinian people to an independent, sovereign, viable, and geographically continuous state. It called on the United States to put pressure on Israel to stop its unilateral actions that are destroying the two-state solution and to reopen the US Consulate General in the occupied city of East Jerusalem, cancel the classification of the Palestine Liberation Organization, the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people, as a terrorist organization, and reopen the organization’s mission in Washington. The Council also reaffirmed that East Jerusalem is the capital of the State of Palestine, rejected any attempt to diminish the Palestinian right to sovereignty over it, and called on Arab and Islamic countries, organizations and funds to translate support for the city of Jerusalem into practical interventions.
Source: En – Palestine news & Information Agency – WAFA
