The United States said this Wednesday (3) that the establishment of an independent Palestinian state must happen through negotiations between the parties involved and not through the United Nations (UN).
The Palestinian Authority requested on Tuesday (2) a new analysis of a 2011 request to become a full member of the UN.
It currently has de facto recognition as a sovereign State of Palestine, after the UN granted it non-member observer state status in 2012.
The position of the USA, Israel's most important ally, reflects that of the Israelis on this issue.
An application to become a full member of the UN must be approved by the 15-member Security Council – in which the US has veto power – and then by two-thirds of the 193-nation General Assembly.
When asked whether the US would use its Security Council veto to block the Palestinian attempt, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said: “I'm not going to speculate about what might happen in the future.”
But he added that the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with security guarantees for Israel “is something that has to be done through direct negotiations between the parties — it is something we are trying right now — and not at the UN.”
The Palestinian push to become a full member of the UN comes as the war between Israel and Palestinian Hamas militants in Gaza approaches six months and Israel is expanding settlements in the occupied West Bank.
Malta presides over the Security Council in April. Malta's UN ambassador, Vanessa Frazier, said on Wednesday that the Palestinian request had been distributed to Council members.
“We will consult each of the Council members to decide which path to take,” Vanessa Frazier told reporters.
Palestinian UN Ambassador Riyad Mansour told Reuters on Monday that the aim was for the Security Council to make a decision at its April 18 Middle East meeting, but that a vote had not yet been scheduled.
Since the signing of the Oslo Accords, between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, in the early 1990s, little progress has been made towards guaranteeing a Palestinian State.
Source: CNN Brasil
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