Discovering MENA: Abbas’ All Or Nothing

Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian National Authority, announced on 12 November during a LAS meeting that the request whereby the UN General Assembly would grant Palestine enhanced observer status would be formalized today. “A majority vote is already guaranteed”Abbas told reporters in Cairo. Palestinians officials estimate at least 130 countries will vote for the proposal. EU member states will unsurprisingly find themselves, once again, divided, and their votes will surely follow the same direction as in the “UNESCO case” last year: 11 supported the entry of Palestine as a state, 5 opposed, and the remaining 11 abstained.

This time last year, a similar demand presented by Abbas to recognize Palestine as a full member state of United Nations was blocked in the Organization’s Security Council met by U.S. opposition – so this year Abbas seeks recognition as a “non-member observer state” before the General Assembly, where they expect to win enough support and there is no threat of a veto. Although the country will not become a proper UN member, the idea is to achieve similar recognition to the Vatican (the “Vatican status”) and have therefore access to UN agencies and international courts of justice with the same rights as a state. For example, as a U.N. observer member, the Palestinians could press for Israelis to be prosecuted for war crimes at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. The PLO, the only authority nowadays representing Palestinians in the international arena, only has “permanent observer” status. Another thorny issue the media is not mentioning is the border: while some pundits suggest that the most likely solution is to recognize the boundaries set in 1967, it is possible the UN refers the decision to the parties.

This move is considered by both U.S. and Israel as a “unilateral initiative” ultimately seeking international recognition. Both countries argue that Palestinian statehood may only be obtained (if ever) through a negotiating process and that the latter will be utterly damaged by Abbas’ move. But the latest round of this kind of negotiations stalled more than years ago, mainly because of Israel’s refusal to stop building settlements, illegal under International Law, in the West Bank (as the 1300 approved just last week). The actual lack of viable alternatives has thus somewhat forced the Palestinians to push through this diplomatic initiative to advance their aspirations of statehood within the 1967 borders. Abbas has said the bid is “the only way to address the assault of settlement activity and to save the two-state solution”.

Against this background, Israel (which has dubbed Abbas’s initiative “diplomatic terrorism”) has already undertaken a full-blown counterattack campaign. While Abbas and his negotiating team keep raising support for his diplomatic initiative, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, recently met with Israeli ambassadors in Vienna in an effort to better coordinate their counter-strategy. To that effect they count with the support of the newly re-elected U.S. President Barak Obama, who called Abbas weeks ago and asked him to postpone the Palestinian request. The U.S. State Department has also sent a “private memo” to European ambassadors to the UN, warning of a possible “collision” and “negative consequences” if their countries lend their support to the Palestinian state. In response, Palestinian leader Mohamed Stayyeh affirmed: “Obama has had four years to give us something, but has not done so”.

Means Israel threatens to retaliate with range from cutting off financial flows to the Palestinian Authority (as it did last year via the withholding of tax transfers) to cutting water and electricity supplies to the people in the Occupied Territories, together with accelerating the expansion of settlements or deleting the permissions some Palestinians have to cross checkpoints and leave their territory. The Foreign Ministry released a “leaked” draft mentioning the possibility of even overthrowing Abbas. The document instructs Israeli ambassadors to convey the following message in their respective capitals: if the Palestinians go ahead with their project, Israel will dismantle the Palestinian authority and overthrow its president. “If the Palestinian proposal is accepted by the UN General Assembly, this would mean breaking the rules”, Lieberman said. Washington could also cut the financial flow to the Palestinians, as it has already done in the past. “We are asked to choose between bread and freedom. We need food to eat, but we also need freedom”, said Palestinian political leader Mohamed Shtayeh. Israel has allegedly also offered some carrots if Abbas drops the bid, including recognizing the PA as a state in temporary borders .

I am really hopeful this could represent a first step towards what should have happened decades ago, but I should however stress a key point: whatever happens at the UN, the Palestinian territories will remain under occupation, internally divided and largely dependent on foreign aid for years, and that’s something we have outrageously gotten used to. Moreover, one issue adds to the eventuality of the result: after the ceasefire in Gaza (even though many believed Abbas’ plan will be overshadowed, the result has been the exact opposite, and more countries have expressed their willingness to vote in favor, as they believe they have to support an alternative to the armed resistance of Hamas), taking into account the recent bouts of protest, with Abbas’ popularity plummeting and negotiations with Israel at a standstill, are Palestinians actually paying attention? Do they really give a damn what the international community thinks at this stage?