HAMILTON, Canada
Palestine's UN ambassador Riyad Mansour along with other UN envoys condemned recent Israeli measures aimed at expanding control over the West Bank, warning that it amounts to the de facto annexation of Palestinian land in the occupied territory.
"We are gathered here today in order to express our outrage and condemnation for what the Israeli cabinet decided yesterday with regard to what will amount to the annexation of the land of the Palestinian people, especially in the West Bank," Mansour told a news conference Tuesday at UN headquarters in New York.
Mansour said the Palestinian mission has initiated formal diplomatic steps at the UN to challenge the Israeli decision and press for its reversal through multilateral action.
He added that a letter outlining Palestine's position had already been circulated to the UN Security Council, the UN secretary-general and the president of the General Assembly.
Mansour also said that he personally briefed the Security Council president on Monday afternoon, adding that Palestine expects the Council "to shoulder its responsibility to defend international law, including human rights law and humanitarian law."
Mansour said Palestinian diplomats would continue engaging with council members in the coming days, including meetings with the elected members, the permanent five, and the UN secretary-general, to push for action.
"There is a Prime Minister of an extreme government coming to Washington, DC, challenging everyone that he is going to impose annexation and take the land of the Palestinian people," he said, stressing that "this is another test before all of these processes, whether (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu will succeed against all of us, or whether we collectively succeed in defending what we agreed to."
Türkiye's UN envoy Ahmet Yildiz, speaking on behalf of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), also condemned Israel's actions, warning they would further destabilize the region.
"The OIC Group condemns in the strongest terms the illegal Israeli decisions and measures aimed at imposing unlawful Israeli sovereignty, entrenching settlement activity, and enforcing a new legal and administrative reality in the occupied West Bank," Yildiz said.
"They undermine the two-state solution, the ongoing peace efforts, and represent an assault on the inalienable right of the Palestinian people to realize their independent and sovereign state on the 1967 lines, with occupied Jerusalem as its capital," he added.
Syria's UN envoy Ibrahim Olabi, speaking on behalf of the Arab Group, echoed the condemnation, describing Israel's measures as a flagrant breach of international law.
"The Arab Group condemns, in the strongest terms, the illegal Israeli decision and measures aimed at imposing unlawful Israeli sovereignty," Olabi said, adding the move "accelerates attempts at its illegal annexation and the displacement of the Palestinian people."
The UN envoys' remarks came after Israel's security cabinet approved measures Sunday aimed at altering the legal and civil framework in the occupied West Bank to strengthen Israeli control.
According to Israeli media, the decisions include repealing a law that barred the sale of land in the West Bank to private Israeli individuals, unsealing land ownership records, and shifting authority for building permits in a settlement bloc near Hebron from a Palestinian municipality to Israel’s civil administration.