Washington announces it won’t grant visas to Palestinian officials to attend the UN General Assembly next month
The United States announced Friday that it won’t grant visas to Palestinian Authority officials to attend the UN General Assembly next month, where France intends to recognize the state of Palestine.
This unusual move further aligns the Trump administration with the Israeli government, which strongly rejects the establishment of a Palestinian state and seeks to exclude the Palestinian Authority from any future role in Gaza.
The US State Department said in a statement that “Secretary of State Marco Rubio is denying and revoking visas for members of the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Palestinian Authority ahead of the UN General Assembly”.
The US State Department added, “The Trump administration is clear: It’s in our national security interest to hold the PLO and the Palestinian Authority accountable for failing to fulfill their commitments and undermining prospects for peace”.
The State Department also accused the Palestinians of waging lawfare by resorting to the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice to sue Israel.
Trump has repeatedly used the term “lawfare” to describe his legal woes since leaving office at the end of his first term.
The US State Department said the Palestinian Authority must halt attempts to bypass negotiations through international legal battles, and efforts to secure unilateral recognition of a hypothetical Palestinian state.
Under the agreement between the United States and the United Nations as host country of the UN in New York, Washington isn’t supposed to deny visas to officials traveling to the organization.
The US State Department declared its commitment to the agreement by allowing the Palestinian mission to the United Nations.
This comes as the push for recognition of the State of Palestine continues to escalate.
In late July, 15 Western countries, including France, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Portugal, issued a collective appeal to recognize the State of Palestine and implement a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.
Finally, several countries, including Britain, France, and Australia, announced their intention to recognize the State of Palestine during the UN General Assembly meetings next September.
Of the 193 member states of the international organization, at least 149 currently recognize the State of Palestine, which was declared by the Palestinian leadership in exile in 1988.
For its part, the Palestinian Foreign Ministry expressed its deep astonishment at the US decision to revoke the visas of Palestinian officials, including President Mahmoud Abbas, considering it a violation of the 1947 United Nations Headquarters Agreement.
The United Nations Headquarters Agreement, signed in 1947 between the United Nations and the United States, is the agreement regulating the presence of the United Nations headquarters in New York.
The agreement stipulates that the United States is committed to facilitating the entry of representatives of member states, UN officials, and experts into its territory, and issuing them the necessary visas, regardless of the political relations between Washington and their countries.
On July 31, the US State Department announced that Washington had imposed sanctions on Palestinian Authority officials and members of the Palestine Liberation Organization, alleging that they “violated peace commitments by seeking to internationalize the conflict with Israel”.
Meanwhile, Washington recently lifted sanctions on violent Israeli settlers accused of carrying out attacks on Palestinians.
