French President Emmanuel Macron (L) shakes hands with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas at his headquarters in the West Bank city of Ramallah. AFP
Days before the July 28-30 conference on fostering Israeli and Palestinian states living peacefully side-by-side to be co-chaired by Riyadh and Paris, French President Emmanuel Macron announced that France would formally recognise the State of Palestine in September.
His declaration "will breathe new life into a conference that seemed destined to irrelevance," said Richard Gowan, an analyst at International Crisis Group.
"Macron's announcement changes the game. Other participants will be scrabbling to decide if they should also declare an intent to recognise Palestine."
According to an AFP database, at least 142 of the 193 UN member states -- including France -- now recognise the Palestinian state proclaimed by the Palestinian leadership in exile in 1988.
In 1947, the 181 resolution of the UN General Assembly decided on the partition of Palestine, then under a British mandate, into two independent states -- one Jewish and the other Arab.
The following year, the State of Israel was proclaimed in the Palestinian Territories.
For several decades, the vast majority of UN member states have supported the idea of a two-state solution: Israeli and Palestinian, living side-by-side peacefully and securely.
But after 77 years of Israeli occupation and more than 21 months of war in Gaza, the ongoing expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, and senior Israeli officials declaring designs to annexe occupied territory, it is feared that a Palestinian state could be geographically impossible.
The New York conference is a response to the crisis, with Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa and several dozen ministers from around the world expected to attend.
'No alternative'
The meeting comes as a two-state solution is "more threatened than it has ever been (but) even more necessary than before, because we see very clearly that there is no alternative," said a French diplomatic source.
Beyond facilitating conditions for recognition of a Palestinian state, the meeting will have three other focuses -- reform of the Palestinian Authority, disarmament of Hamas and its exclusion from Palestinian public life, and normalisation of relations with Israel by Arab states that have not yet done so.
The diplomatic source warned that no announcement of new normalisation deals was expected next week.
Ahead of the conference, which was delayed from June, Britain said it would not recognise a Palestinian state unilaterally and would wait for "a wider plan" for peace in the region.
The conference "offers a unique opportunity to transform international law and the international consensus into an achievable plan and to demonstrate resolve to end the occupation and conflict once and for all, for the benefit of all peoples," said the Palestinian ambassador to the UN, Riyad Mansour, calling for "courage" from participants.
Israel and the United States will not take part in the meeting.
As international pressure continues to mount on Israel to end nearly two years of war in Gaza, the humanitarian catastrophe in the ravaged coastal territory is expected to dominate speeches by representatives of more than 100 countries as they take to the podium from Monday to Wednesday.
* This story was edited by Ahram Online.
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