Dissecting The Palestinian Statehood Bid

The Palestinian statehood issue is entangled in so many UN procedural details that it can make things confusing. Here is a quick look at these procedural issues and what they mean:

About the Recognition Process: Mahmoud Abbas said he would bring a request for UN recognition to the Secretary General on Friday the 23rd, the day of his speech at the GA. The fact that Abbas is only putting in the request Friday is significant — this means there will be no decision on statehood at the GA meetings or possibly several weeks after it because of UN procedures. Once the Secretary General receives the application for statehood, he will submit it to the Security Council which will then create a committee to look at the request. The Security Council Committee can take several weeks to look over a request. And it might actually never make its way to the Security Council for a vote. 

For a resolution to pass, the Security Council needs 9 vote for and no votes against from the five permanent members with veto power. The US has said it would VETO any resolution for Palestinian statehood, but European countries and the US are negotiating hard for other Security Council members to abstain from voting. If the US and the Europeans (Germany, France, UK, maybe Portugal) can get two or three other Council members from abstaining (Nigeria, Gabon, Bosnia are the countries that have been mentioned) then the Palestinians won’t have the necessary 9 votes, the US won’t need to use its veto, and the resolution might not even make it all the way to a vote.

Even though Abbas is meeting with Obama and the Europeans tonight, US/EU will not convince Abbas to give up his request for statehood. But, what the US/EU might convince Abbas to do is delay the actual process with bureaucratic red tape, and allow the Quartet — the US, UN, Russia and EU-led diplomatic group that negotiates for Middle East peace — to set the stage for resumption of negotiations between Israel and the PA.

In the end, it seems the Obama administration might be able to avoid an actual “showdown” at the Security Council. Abbas will get to keep his promise about asking the UN for recognition and not show weakness. And it might open the door for Palestinians and Israelis to return to the negotiating table for the first time in nearly 12 months.