French UN Resolution Sets 18-Month Deadline For Palestine-Israel deal

May 20, 2015 by OccPalGaza 2 Comments

French UN resolution sets 18-month deadline for Israeli-Palestinian deal

The resolution will only be submitted after the June 30 Iran deal deadline; if no agreement is reached, France will recognize the Palestinian state, the report says.

By Barak Ravid

A draft of the proposed French United Nations Security Council resolution on the Israel-Palestinian conflict was published by the French newspaper Le Figaro on Wednesday.

According to the newspaper, the draft resolution, which is being promoted by French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, calls for the immediate resumption of negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians and their conclusion in a permanent agreement within 18 months.

If no agreement is reached in the allotted time, France will recognize the Palestinian state, according to Le Figaro.

The draft has been circulated by the French Foreign Ministry to the Arab League and UN Security Council members such as Britain and Spain.

Fabius set the relatively short deadline due to the ongoing deterioration of conditions in the West Bank. Another reason is the desire to complete the negotiations before the end of President Francois Hollande’s term in 2017.

The proposed French resolution will only be tabled after the June 30 deadline set for the nuclear negotiations with Iran. The intention is to bring it to a vote in the Security Council during the General Assembly session in New York in September.

It calls for the establishment of a Palestinian state “based on the June 4, 1967 lines, with mutually agreed and equal land swaps.”

It also calls for the positioning of Israel’s security requirements “at the center of the peace talks.”

According to the report, the French draft provides for the establishment a system that “guarantees the security of both Israel and the Palestinians, with effective oversight over borders, and prevents the reappearance of terror and the smuggling of munitions.”

The draft resolution also requires that security arrangements respect “the sovereignty of the demilitarized Palestinian state, including the complete, though phased, withdrawal of the Israeli army during a transitional stage, the length of which will be agreed between the parties.”

The French text includes a call for “a just solution, that is balanced and realistic regarding the Palestinian refugees,” emphasizing that it will have to be based on a mechanism to compensate the refugees.

It also establishes that Jerusalem will be the capital of both states, according to the report, In reference to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s demand that the Palestinians recognize Israel as the Jewish state, it says that the agreement will embody “the principle of two states for two nations.”