THE PALESTINIAN AMBASSADOR to Ireland has welcomed Tánaiste Micheál Martin’s statement on the Government’s intention to recognise the State of Palestine in “the next few weeks”.
Dr Jilan Wahba Abdalmajid told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland programme that the recognition of Palestinian statehood would provide further support and affirmation of the Palestinian people’s rights.
She said that the attacks against Israel last October did not occur “out of thin air” and that the denial of Palestinians’ rights to statehood and self-determination is the root cause of the conflict.
“So as long as the whole world and Israel deny the rights of the Palestinians, this area, this region will continue to be flaming,” she said.
“It’s important to recognise the rights of the Palestinians to have peace in that region. I think we deserve this right. We have the right to have a state on our land.”
In his comments yesterday, Martin said: “Be in no doubt, recognition of a Palestinian state will happen.”
Abdalmajid said she welcomed the Tánaiste’s comments in the Dáil yesterday, adding that she hoped it would become a reality soon and that other EU states would follow suit.
Abdalmajid said recognition from Ireland would not change things in a practical sense “on the ground” in Palestine, but would rather be an affirmation of an existing right to statehood.
“It’s a matter of giving hope as well for the Palestinians that the international community recognise this nation and recognise its right to self determination and to have a right to have its own state,” she said.
Asked if the Irish Government should have made the move earlier, Abdalmajid said it should, pointing to legislation that has been on the books – and in the programme for government – for years.
Palestine is already recognised by most UN member states (72%), with western European and Anglosphere countries being outliers on the global stage. However, Palestine is not a full member state of the UN, holding non-member observer state status.
The Palestinian Authority, which governs the occupied West Bank, has this week launched an attempt to achieve member state status after a failed bid in 2011. Acceptance depends on a vote in the UN Security Council and last time Palestine did not attain the required number of sponsors, so the vote never came about.
The United States position has been that it will use its veto to block such an effort, saying that recognition from Israel resulting from negotiations must happen first.
On Monday, Palestine’s ambassador to the UN, Riyad Mansour said: “All we ask for is our rightful place among nations and to be treated as equals.”
In Ireland, a Bill recognising Palestinian statehood passed successfully through both the Seanad and the Dáil in 2014, but the Government has yet to follow through on it, instead saying it wished to do so in coordination with other EU states.
At the meeting of EU heads of state in Brussels last month, then-Taoiseach Leo Varadkar met his counterparts from Spain, Slovenia and Malta on the sidelines to discuss the possibility of recognising Palestine together.
“We discussed together our readiness to recognise Palestine and said that we would do so when it can make a positive contribution and the circumstances are right,” Varadkar said at the time.
The previous month, Varadkar had said that “a number of EU states acting together to recognise Palestine could enable a more equal negotiation to happen, after the war has ended in Gaza, in around a two state solution”.
Micheál Martin is due to discuss the topic with Spanish President Pedro Sanchez tomorrow.
When asked if a two-state solution was still viable, Abdalmajid said it was.
“If there is a will, there will be a way,” she said, noting that Israel was already a recognised member state at the UN while Palestine is not.
“The state of Israel is there, let’s talk about the state of Palestine.”
Abdalmajid was asked about how a two-state solution could be possible when Hamas – the party governing Gaza – is bent on destroying Israel and the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed never to allow a Palestinian state.
In reply, she said that the leadership of either territory (Gaza or Israel) should not come into the debate when discussing the right of the entire Palestinian people to statehood.
“It’s not a matter of what’s going on (at the moment), it’s a matter of a right that should be acknowledged.”
She included Hamas when she said, “If this right is respected, I don’t think any Palestinian will think about anything else other than peace”.
On the question of Hamas relenting in its attacks against Israel if Palestine became fully recognised at the UN, Abdalmajid said she believed the group would do so, citing their revised charter published in 2017 that accepted a Palestinian state along the borders established in 1967. That document still did not, however, commit to recognising the state of Israel.
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