UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres addresses the Arab League summit in Tunisia and calls for the establishment of a Palestinian state with a capital in East Jerusalem.
“There is no Plan B. Without two states, there is no solution,” he says.
Guterres stressed that the Arab region seeks to achieve peace and stability, asserting that the main goal of the UN agenda is to support the Arab world’s aspirations.
During the inaugural session of the Arab Summit on Sunday in Tunisia, Guterres said that his participation in the event is meant to enhance ties between the UN and the Arab League (AL) as well as with the Arab peoples and North Africa.
The whole world is grateful to the Arab culture which enriched the human culture over centuries, the UN chief reiterated.
Guterres also noted recent violence between Israel and Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip, calling it “a tragic reminder of the fragility of the situation.”
Turning to Syria, Guterres says any plan for resolving the Syrian civil war must respect the country’s territorial integrity, “including the occupied Golan.”
US President Donald Trump last week recognized Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, which it captured from Syria in the 1967 Six Day War and later effectively annexed in a move rejected internationally.
Following US President Donald Trump’s recognition of the Golan Heights as Israeli territory, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas says the White House will next allow Israel to annex parts of the West Bank.
“What is coming from the United States is more dangerous. It will tell Israel, ‘annex part of the Palestinian land and give what remains of it self-rule and grant the Gaza Strip a nominal state for Hamas to play with,’” Abbas said at the Arab League summit in Tunisia.
A senior Israeli official said last Tuesday that US recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan will help the Jewish state lay claim to other lands it captured during its wars. The official, whom the New York Times named as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, appeared to be hinting at potential future West Bank annexation.
Right-wing leaders such as The New Right’s Naftali Bennett have long advocated for Israeli annexation of the so-called Area C, some 60% of the West Bank.
The continued pro Israeli bias under President Trump , according to Abbas, means that the Palestinians will likely reject the deal which the Trump administration is preparing to resolve the decades-long Middle East conflict.
We will not accept any deal that does not account for the results of previous peace talks and resolutions of the UN Security Council, including the demand to stop Israeli occupation and create a sovereign Palestinian state with a capital in Jerusalem. He said.
The terms of the promised “deal of the century” remain obscure, while the date it is to be made public has been pushed back several times. The current expectation is that the proposed agreement will be unveiled in early April.
The Arab League summit provided the opportunity for member states to briefly overcome regional rivalries and unite to condemn the US move to recognize Israel’s annexation of Syria’s Golan Heights. The strategically located territory which was discovered to be very rich in oil a few years ago has been under Israeli occupation since the 1967 war. No nation except Israel, and now the US, considers it part of Israel.
Agencies
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