The administration of the President of the United States, Donald Trump, announced that it refused and revealed visas to members of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the Palestinian Authority (PA) before the United Nations General Assembly (Unga) in September.
The announcement was made in a statement published Friday by the US State Department.
“The Trump administration was clear: it is in our national security interests to hold the PLO and the AP responsible for not complying with their commitments and having undermined the perspectives of peace,” the statement said.
The press release said that members “regularly had to repudiate terrorism”, citing the attack led by October 7, 2023 against southern Israel.
He also accused the Palestinian authority of “attempts to bypass negotiations” by calling on the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice for Israeli abuses committed both in an occupied West Bank and throughout the War of Israel in Gaza, which UN experts called a genocide.
The AP, which has a limited autonomous authority in occupied West Bank, and the PLO, the organization of internationally recognized Palestinian umbrellas, serves as representatives of the Palestinian people and pushes for the recognition of a Palestinian state on the world scene.
The Trump administration had previously sanctioned the members of the AP and the PLO, accusing them of the “glorification of violence” and “undermining peace”.
It was not immediately clear to which officials the refusals would apply, because the members of the UN and non -member observers such as Palestine generally send large delegations to Unga.
On Friday, in the press release, the United States Department of State declared that it would grant derogations from the mission of the Palestinian Authority to the United Nations, currently led by Ambassador Riyad Mansour.
Addressing journalists shortly after the announcement, Mansour said that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas planned to attend the United Nations Rally next month, which should include a September 22 segment on Palestinian rights.
He said it was not clear if the American move would affect Abbas’ visit.
“We will see exactly what it means and how it applies to one of our delegations, and we will respond accordingly,” he said.
In a statement published by the Palestinian news agency of WAFA, the presidency of the Palestinian authority expressed “deep regrets and astonishment” to the decision.
He called on the administration to “reconsider and cancel its decision, reaffirming the total commitment of Palestine to international law, United Nations resolutions and obligations to peace”.
Reports from Washington, DC, Alan Fisher from Tel Aviv Tribune explained that as a host state, the United States is supposed to grant visas to representatives of UN members to visit the headquarters of the international organization.
“It will be controversial,” said Fisher. “When the United Nations was trained in 1947 and whose head office is in New York, it was agreed that, in fact, American immigration policies would not have an impact on people who wanted to go to official affairs.”
However, Fisher noted that the United States had denied visas to certain officials in the past, notably by denying the president of the OLP, Yasser Arafat, a visa to visit the United Nations headquarters in 1988, which prompted the Anga to stand in place in Geneva, Switzerland that year.
More recently, the United States denied a visa for Omar Al-Bashir, then head of Sudan, to visit the rally in 2013.
“The reason is that he was wanted by the International Criminal Court,” said Fisher.
“Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is also wanted by the International Criminal Court. However, he should be here in New York next month. ”
