More diplomatic concessions at the UN for Israel’s existence

Fabricated claims of UN bias against Israel continue to fuel Israeli media reports covering this year’s UN General Assembly. As Mahmoud Abbas played the usual game of fluctuating threats mellowed into diluted warnings, Israel embarked upon its own predictable propaganda tactic to portray international leaders as being intent on ignoring regional violence to shift focus upon “Israel’s conduct”.

Omitted from the colonial narrative was the fact that leaders criticising Israel’s belligerence are still openly supportive of its expansionist, colonial agenda, as evidenced by the usual selective discourse and separation of historical factors, combined with the financial, economic and military ties that the international community has with Israel. (Not to mention that the Israeli government has consistently demonstrated oppressive tools and surveillance measures to other countries, armies and police departments, ready to be exported — at a tidy profit to Israel — both ideologically and practically.)

There was no deviation from the usual jargon about the establishment of a Palestinian state upon the fragments of Palestinian territory which remain unoccupied and colonised by Israel. This was despite it being known full well that Israel’s colonial expansion will eventually eliminate any possible hypothesis about Palestine’s existence from a purely geographic point of view apart from anything else.

While UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon hailed the raising of Palestine’s flag at the UN as a symbol of “hope”, only activists raised the dissonance between a symbolic piece of material fluttering in the breeze and the harrowing reality that leaves little opportunity for even imagining a Palestinian state, given Israel’s dominance, Palestinian Authority acquiescence and international collaboration. History is obliterated at an international level to introduce new forms of mass oblivion.

Brazilian President Dilma Roussef’s opening speech contained a mild criticism of Israel’s continued illegal settlement expansion in the occupied Palestinian territories and insisted that “we can no longer delay… the creation of a Palestinian state, coexisting peacefully and harmoniously with Israel.” Qatar’s representative, Amir Tamim Bin Hamad Al-Thani, spoke against delays in addressing “the occupation” and insisted that the establishment of a Palestinian state “requires an Israeli partner for peace.”

President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi of Egypt remained within the comfortable 1967 borders as the means of “resolving this conflict and empowering the Palestinian people to exercise their right to self-determination”. However, he had the audacity to say this even as Palestinians in Gaza risk complete isolation through his government’s policy of flooding and destroying “lifeline” tunnels in collaboration with the PA in Ramallah.

According to South African President Jacob Zuma, delays in a resolving “the Palestinian question” will result in “no longer having a piece of land to justify the two-state solution.” It is, however, unacceptable that international leaders still fall upon the excuse of justifying a two-state compromise which is nothing but a cover for Israel to complete its colonisation process. The lenience expressed by the international community should be enough to put a halt to Israel’s manipulative agenda. Yet, Palestinian leaders themselves continue to subjugate themselves to Israel and its international supporters by failing to assert their history.

It is humiliating to have the international community discuss Palestine as a perpetual last resort in order to justify and ensure Israel’s colonial existence, when every country should be clamouring for its dissolution. However, it is far more degrading for the Palestinians to be misrepresented constantly by people and entities seeking to legitimise their pathetic and increasingly ineffective structure through misplaced priorities dictated by Israeli and international interests.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.