On 28 October 1974, the 1974 Arab League summit held in Rabat designated the PLO as the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people and reaffirmed their right to establish an independent state of urgency."[5]
Despite the 1988 proclamation of the State of Palestine, at the time the Palestine Liberation Organization did not exercise control over any territory,[6] and designated Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine,[i][7] which was under Israeli control and claimed by it as Israel's capital. The PLO was hence a government in exile between 1988 and 1994.[citation needed]
The Partition Plan served as the basis for Israel's declaration of independence, but was not accepted by the Palestinian Arab leadership at the time. Though, in September 1948, the All-Palestine Government was declared within the Gaza Strip as an Egyptian protectorate and recognized by most members of the Arab League, which is regarded by some[who?] as the first attempt to establish an independent Palestinian state; All-Palestine had however been dissolved by Egypt several years later. The 1988 declaration does not explicitly recognize the State of Israel. However, an accompanying document[8] that explicitly mentions UN Security Council Resolution 242, and Yasser Arafat's statements in Geneva a month later[9] were accepted by the United States as sufficient to interpret the declaration as recognizing Israel in its pre-1967 boundaries.[citation needed]
The declaration's reference to Palestine being the "land of the three monotheistic faiths" has been held as recognising the Jewish historical connection to the land. Referring to "the historical injustice inflicted on the Palestinian Arab people resulting in their dispersion and depriving them of their right to self-determination," the declaration recalled the Treaty of Lausanne (1923) and UN General Assembly Resolution 181 as supporting the rights of Palestinians to statehood. The declaration then proclaims a "State of Palestine on our Palestinian territory with its capital Jerusalem".[10][11] The borders of the state are not specified. The population of the state was referred to by the statement: "The State of Palestine is the state of Palestinians wherever they may be". The state was defined as an Arab country by the statement: "The State of Palestine is an Arab state, an integral and indivisible part of the Arab nation".[citation needed]
Consequences
The declaration was accompanied by a PNC call for multilateral negotiations on the basis of UN Security Council Resolution 242. This call was later termed "the Historic Compromise",[12] as it implied acceptance of the "two-state solution", namely that it no longer questioned the legitimacy of the State of Israel.[11] The PNC's political communiqué accompanying the declaration called only for withdrawal from "Arab Jerusalem" and the other "Arab territories occupied."[13]Yasser Arafat's statements in Geneva a month later[9][14] were accepted by the United States as sufficient to remove the ambiguities it saw in the declaration and to fulfill the longheld conditions for open dialogue with the United States.[15][16]
As a result of the declaration, the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) convened, inviting Yasser Arafat, Chairman of the PLO to give an address. United Nations General Assembly Resolution 43/177 was adopted "acknowledging the proclamation of the State of Palestine by the Palestine National Council on 15 November 1988," and it was further decided that "the designation 'Palestine' should be used in place of the designation 'Palestine Liberation Organization' in the United Nations system." One hundred and four states voted for this resolution, forty-four abstained, and two – the United States and Israel – voted against.[17] By mid-December, 75 states had recognised Palestine, rising to 93 states by February 1989.[18]
On 31 December 2014, the United Nations Security Council voted down a resolution demanding the end of Israeli occupation and Palestinian statehood by 2017. Eight members voted for the Resolution (Russia, China, France, Argentina, Chad, Chile, Jordan, Luxembourg). However the resolution did not get the minimum of nine votes needed to pass the resolution. Australia and the United States voted against the resolution, with the United Kingdom, Lithuania, Nigeria, South Korea and Rwanda abstaining.[21][22][23]
^Tom Lansford, Political Handbook of the World 2014, p. 1628. CQ Press, March 2014.
"On April 2, 1989, the PLO's Central Council unanimously elected Arafat president of the self-proclaimed Palestinian state and designated Faruk Qaddumi as foreign minister ..."
^Madiha Rashid Al-Madfai, Jordan, the United States and the Middle East Peace Process, 1974–1991, Cambridge Middle East Library, Cambridge University Press (1993). ISBN0-521-41523-3. p 21.
^Quandt, William B. (1993). Peace Process: American Diplomacy and the Arab-Israeli conflict since 1967. Washington: Brookings Institution. pp. 367–375, 494. ISBN0-520-08390-3.