Speaking at the UN General Assembly plenary session - dominated this year by the Palestinian bid for statehood - US President Barack Obama reiterated his intention to veto the move in the Security Council, also advising the Palestinians to refrain from going to the UNGA to pass a resolution in their favour. He insisted that the Palestinians cannot achieve their objective "through statements and resolutions" at the world body and peace in the Middle East cannot be achieved through UN resolutions, telling them to return to 'peace talks.'
How ironic whereas UN resolutions can bring about the destruction of peace in the Middle East for creating a state for the European Jews on Arab soil, the attack and occupation of Iraq and bring about a regime change but they cannot bring peace. Furthermore, speaking at the same place at the same time a year ago, Obama had held out the promise, "this time will be different," adding "when we come back here next year, we can have an agreement that will lead to a new member of the United Nations - an independent sovereign state of Palestine." Yet nothing is different. Forgetting his own words, he has come out strongly in support of the US's protégé and to keep the Palestinians from seeking support from a sympathetic majority of the UNGA member states.
Obama must know from his own experience the emptiness of his rhetoric. Unlike some of his predecessors who sought to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict towards the end of their terms, he had initiated the Middle East peace discussions almost at the beginning of his presidency. As a result, the Palestinians agreed to return to the negotiation table on the condition that Israel would stop building settlements in the occupied territories as part of its expansionist plan. The talks did not take long to come to a grinding halt due to Israeli intransigence. They broke last September after the Netanyahu government announced an end to the moratorium on settlement construction. The fact of the matter is that 18 years of negotiations have yielded nothing. Israel has used various peace initiatives only to gain time in order to usurp more and more Palestinian lands. It reneged on the Oslo Peace Accords, and later kept refusing to talk to Arafat, demanding a 'better' peace partner like President Mehmoud Abbas. After nearly a decade of talks, Abbas has nothing to show for his efforts.
There is little reason therefore for the Palestinians to pay heed to Obama's advice that negotiations are the best way to achieve peace. They have rightly decided to go the UNGA route, where a majority is expected to vote in favour of a statehood resolution. True, as Obama said, a UNGA resolution cannot help achieve the objective, but it will certainly constitute a great moral victory for the Palestinian cause. The case exemplifies the superpower's double standards. It brandishes UN resolutions to advance its designs, like in the case of invasion and occupation of Iraq, but makes light of them where they support weaker peoples. Security Council Resolution 242 for one, calls on Israel to vacate all territories it occupied in 1967 war, which is where the Palestinians now want to establish their state. Going by legal and moral principles, the return of the lands occupied through an act of war shouldn't even be negotiable. Still, the Palestinians have been seeking a negotiated settlement, but in vain. As regards, Obama's policy, it is likely to work to his advantage in his re-election bid, but it will bring isolation for both America and Israel at a time the Middle East is in deep ferment. Time certainly is on the side of the Palestinians. They will ultimately gain what is their due from the Arab awakening rather than meaningless talks.
Comments
Comments are closed.