Talking on the UN Common Meeting, the Palestinian president accused the UN and the US of double requirements.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has demanded the USA pursue justice over the killing of Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh.
“In addition to having Palestinian nationality, she was additionally an American citizen,” Abbas stated in remarks on the 77th session of the United Nations Common Meeting (UNGA) on Friday. “I dare the USA to prosecute those that killed this American nationwide, however they received’t. Why? As a result of they’re Israelis.”
Israeli forces shot Abu Akleh in Might whereas she was on task in Jenin, within the occupied West Financial institution.
Abu Akleh was sporting a press vest and was standing with different journalists when she was killed. The UN Human Rights Workplace (OHCHR) gathered proof pointing to the Israeli forces’ culpability, dismissing claims of Palestinian fighters’ exercise within the fast neighborhood of the journalist.
Israel initially stated the journalist had been caught within the crossfire. Earlier this month, Israeli authorities launched the outcomes of an inside investigation that discovered there was a “excessive chance” that she had been “unintentionally hit” by Israeli military hearth.
The report said that there have been no grounds for the launching of a army police investigation as there was “no suspicion of a felony offence”.
Addressing the world leaders gathered on the UN headquarters in New York, Abbas stated he was talking “on behalf of greater than 14 million Palestinians whose fathers and ancestors lived by way of the tragic Nakba 74 years in the past and are nonetheless dwelling the spillover of this Nakba, which is a humiliation for the entire of humanity, particularly for many who have conspired, deliberate and executed this heinous crime”.
“Our belief in the potential for attaining peace based mostly on justice and worldwide regulation sadly is waning as a result of Israeli occupation insurance policies,” he added.
The speech got here a day after Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid advised the UNGA he supported a two-state answer and referred to as on Muslim nations to recognise and make peace with the Jewish nation.
“We have to perceive historical past, respect it and study from it but in addition to be keen and in a position to change. To decide on the long run over the previous, peace over battle,” he stated. “Israeli Arabs are usually not our enemies; they’re our companions in life.”
Abbas rejected Lapid’s conciliatory tone, saying Israel “has determined to not be our associate within the peace course of”.
“It has undermined the Oslo Accords, it has by way of insurance policies – that are premeditated – intentionally destroyed the two-state answer. This proves unequivocally that Israel doesn’t imagine in peace, it’s imposing a established order by power and aggression,” he stated.
The Palestinian chief accused Israel of conducting “a frantic marketing campaign to confiscate our lands, to construct settlements, to loot our sources as if this land is empty … It’s giving whole freedom to the military and to the terrorist settlers who’re killing the Palestinians in broad daylight.”
He blamed the UN and the US for Israel’s impunity. “Have you learnt who’s defending Israel from being held accountable? The United Nations. And on prime of the United Nations, probably the most highly effective within the United Nations,” he stated. “Why these double requirements, why don’t they deal with us equally with the others?”