Ramona Wadi
Middle East Monitor / August 21, 2020
While Israel and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) normalised relations, based upon a US-brokered deal, the United Nations (UN) in turn normalised this latest diplomatic aggression against Palestine, hoping it will: “Create an opportunity for Israeli and Palestinian leaders to re-engage in meaningful negotiations that will realise a two-state solution in line with relevant UN resolutions, international law and bilateral agreements,” as expressed by Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
To further prove how the UN calls for measures that favour colonisation, the statement also praised the halting of Israel’s annexation of land from the occupied West Bank, and according to the statement: “Something the secretary-general has consistently called for.”
UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Nickolay Mladenov went a step further with diplomatic absurdities, stating that the normalisation deal “stops Israeli annexation plans,” contradicting Netanyahu’s assertions that annexation was still on the table.
The UN wants to promote a false façade of having achieved a milestone in terms of “saving” the two-state compromise. Mladenov’s imprecision – most probably intentional – is harmful at a time when the Palestinian people require strong diplomatic voices pointing out the human rights violations, which the UN is encouraging and providing impunity for.
On Monday, Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan met with Guterres to discuss the normalisation agreement and: “A potential peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians,” YNet News reported. No details were given regarding what the peace agreement constitutes.
From this sample of statements and updates, it is clear that the Palestinian people are not even on the bottom rung of the ladder as far as the international community is concerned. Yet,despite its verbal opposition to the normalisation deal, the Palestinian Authority (PA) still upholds the UN’s insistence upon the two-state compromise. If the UN is using the UAE-Israeli ties to advance the two-state diplomacy, what exactly is the PA objecting to? What place does the US’ “deal of the century” now hold in terms of international recognition and acceptance?
Gone are the days when US President Donald Trump was first ridiculed for his lack of verbal eloquence, and the US diplomatically marginalised over the “deal of the century”. The normalisation agreement is tied to Trump’s proposal for fragmenting Palestine, and the UN is not finding any objection to the greater scenario. Pretences have crumbled and the Palestinian people could not have any greater proof of an international community that has consistently worked against their rights. Meanwhile, subjecting every single Palestinian political demand to international scrutiny, eliminating the slightest shard of Palestinian autonomy.
The PA, concurrently, has once again invoked the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative which conditions normalisation upon implementing the two-state paradigm. Annexation is not the only issue, PA leader Mahmoud Abbas stated during a leadership meeting in Ramallah. Correct, yet the same reasoning has not been applied to the two-state compromise by Abbas, who magnified this concept into the only “solution”, and granted the international community all the time required to normalise the colonial expansion, paving the way for discussions regarding annexation. It is useless to speak about the “Arab initiative” or “international resolutions”. Palestine needs a Palestinian initiative. The UN and the PA must stop trading the rights and lives of Palestinians to preserve their diplomatic status within the context of the two-state imposition.
Ramona Wadi is an independent researcher, freelance journalist, book reviewer and blogger; her writing covers a range of themes in relation to Palestine, Chile and Latin America
