The lingering Palestine-Israel conflict

Palestinians still cry for justice and fair play from the international community despite their frantic efforts to live in peace with Israel. The Palestine authority had drafted a resolution for creation of an independent state for Palestinians within one year and withdrawal of all Israeli forces from the occupied territories within three years. But the resolution, drafted in consultation with 22 members of the Arab League failed to have the approval of the Security Council when voted on December 30, 2014.
The resolution did not receive the required nine votes while the US and Australia, non-permanent members of the Security Council, voted against it. The resolution was submitted by France, China and Russia---all veto-wielding permanent members of the Security Council, along with Jordan, a non-permanent member, on behalf of the Palestinians. This means the US remains isolated in the Security Council.
The United Kingdom--another veto-wielding power-- remained absent along with 4 others. Incidentally, both the parliaments of the UK and France accorded recognition to the state of Palestine recently. Palestine representative to the United Nations Ryad Mansour opined quite rightly that "the Security Council was out of step with the overwhelming global consensus to end Israeli occupation".
Having seen the failure to secure required votes, President Mahmood Abbas of the Palestinian authority had signed a number of UN documents to become a member of the International Criminal Court in The Hague. This provoked furious reaction from the administration of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Similarly, the US administration of President Obama sided with Israel by saying Washington was deeply troubled by the Palestinian step. A spokesperson of the Department of State had this to say: "It was entirely counter productive and it did nothing to further aspirations of the Palestinian people for a sovereign and independent state".
Since end of war between Arab countries and Israel in 1967, a number of UN resolutions were adopted to urge Israel to vacate the occupied territories as these belonged to Palestinians. The Madrid conference  brought about a road map to establish the state of Palestine side by side with the state of Israel.
The Oslo peace treaty between Palestinians and Israel and the Camp David accord and other agreements were thrown to dustbin of history. At the initiative of 41st US President George H W Bush, who told the Congress that the time had come to put an end to the Arab-Israeli conflict, the Madrid conference was held from October 30 to November 4, 1991 under joint chairmanship of President George H.W Bush and Soviet President Michael Gorbachev to arrive at a solution to the conflict.
No firm resolution was adopted but a road map was worked out to continue discussions to bring about a resolution of the conflict. In November, 1988, the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) renounced terrorism and accepted the UN Security Council resolutions 242 and 338 which called for Arab-Israeli peace and mutual recognitions accompanied by Israeli withdrawals from territories it had occupied in 1967.
Series of peace talks between Palestinians and Israeli leaders, brokered by the US administration, an ally of Israel in the Middle East, did not produce any tangible results while Israel continued building up houses of Jewish settlers in the occupied territories. President Abbas was under heavy pressure to take action against Israel amid tensions over the collapse of US-brokered peace talks in last spring. The 50- day war between Israel and Palestinians in Gaza strip in August, 2014 caused a devastating effect on Palestinians.
Apparently, the Palestinian authority under Mahmud Abbas would possibly seek remedies through the International Criminal Court, as has been reflected in his comments: "We want to complain. There is aggression against us, against our land. The Security Council disappointed us".
In a dramatic development in Brussels, a declaration adopted by the conference of the fourth Geneva convention, which governs the rules of war and military occupation, goes against occupation by Israel of the Palestinian territories. The resolution laid emphasis on prohibition of colonising of occupied lands and insisted that international humanitarian law be obeyed in areas affected by the conflict between Israel and Palestinians. It called for all serious violations to be investigated and those responsible for breaches to be brought to justice. Presiding judge of the court Swiss Ambassador Paul Fivat said at the concluding session of the conference: "This is a signal and we can hope that words count. Another debacle for Israeli warlords is that the European Union court in Luxembourg ordered  the Palestinian group Hamas to be removed from the European Union's terrorist list for procedural reasons." It said the 28-nation bloc could, however, maintain asset freeze against Hamas members for now. The EU court was of the opinion that the terrorist listing of Hamas was based on press and internet reports and not on acts examined and confirmed in taking decisions of competent authorities.
Both decisions in fact go against Israeli warlords signifying a diplomatic debacle for Tel Aviv. It is high time for both Israel and its strong and blind ally the US to remove all obstacles to declare and accept the state of Palestine which will live side by side with Israel in peace and harmony. The people around the world have seen injustice done to the suffering humanity by Israeli warlords for which the US administration should share responsibility.
Israeli intransigence in settling the Palestinian issue is evident from past records. Since the end of its war with Arab countries in 1967, Israel continued its occupation of Palestinian territories, its construction of Jewish settlements in occupied territories in violation of the Geneva convention and violated repeatedly resolution 242 of the Security Council with tacit approval of the US.

The writer is retired diplomat from Bangladesh
 amjad.21@gmail.com