On the evening of Wednesday 18 September, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, acknowledged “the great significance of the adoption” earlier in the day by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) of a Resolution “demanding inter alia an end to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory within one year”.
The Resolution also demands that Israel comply without delay with all of its legal obligations under international law, including those set out by the International Court of Justice, in particular, to withdraw all of its military forces from the Occupied Palestinian Territory, to cease all new settlement activity, to evacuate all settlers from the Occupied Palestinian Territory and to return the land confiscated since the beginning of the occupation in 1967.
With 124 States voting in favour of this Resolution, “the UN General Assembly has forcefully reaffirmed its commitment to the realisation of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, including their right to an independent and sovereign State, living side by side in peace and security with Israel, in accordance with the relevant resolutions of the UN Security Council and the UN General Assembly”, said the High Representative.
He reiterated the EU’s call for a “lasting and sustainable” peace and reaffirmed that the EU would not recognise either the changes to the 1967 borders or Israeli sovereignty over the territories occupied since 1967, unless the parties agreed.
This Resolution is the first ever presented by the ‘State of Palestine’, the text of which was based on the International Court of Justice’s Advisory Opinion of 19 July (see EUROPE 13458/6).
Following massive pager attacks in Lebanon against alleged members of Hezbollah (see EUROPE 13485/36), the High Representative of the Union called for an independent investigation, stating that “the perpetrators of these attacks aim to spread terror in Lebanon”. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)