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March 15, 2002/Nisan2, 5762, Vol. 54, No. 26
Security Council calls for Palestinian state
MICHAEL J. JORDAN
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
NEW YORK - As violence between Israelis and Palestinians has escalated over the past month, so, too, has U.N. pressure on Israel.
Aided by their diplomatic and bureaucratic allies throughout the U.N. system, the Palestinians have stepped up rhetorical attacks from all directions against the Jewish state, advocates for Israel say.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan on March 12 demanded that Israel end what he described - for the first time, aides said - as its "illegal occupation" of portions of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
In a surprise move, the U.N. Security Council approved a resolution March 12 calling for a Palestinian state next to Israel. It was the first time the council explicitly has endorsed the idea of a Palestinian state.
The resolution was sponsored by the United States and was approved by a 14-0 vote, with Syria abstaining.
Both Israel and the Palestinian Authority welcomed the resolution. Nabil Abu Irdeineh, a spokesman for Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat, said, "The whole world is behind a Palestinian state."
Israeli officials, for their part, noted that the text "demands immediate cessation of all acts of violence, including all forms of terror, provocation, incitement and destruction."
Israel's U.N. ambassador, Yehuda Lancry, termed the resolution balanced - "which is quite a novelty for Israel," he said.
Yet Jewish observers still are braced for next week's reconvening of the historically anti-Israel U.N. Commission on Human Rights in Geneva - the first such session since the United States lost its seat last year to other Western countries.
"It could be a difficult session" for Israel without its trusty defender, an American official said.
Of greater import, they say, is what happens at the Security Council, because of its legally binding authority. The council is the institution responsible for ensuring global peace and security.
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