Italy’s Chamber of Deputies approved resolutions last week backing the Palestine Liberation Organization and committing the government to take concrete steps to end the conflict between Israeli authorities and Palestinian rioters in the administered territories.
The votes Thursday put an official stamp on a foreign policy line giving de facto recognition to the PLKO and urging the government to take any diplomatic initiative to end a situation it defined as no longer tolerable.
The general motion on the territories, pushed by Foreign Minister Giulio Andreotti, passed by a 385-55 majority, with 12 abstentions. It united the five parties of the ruling coalition, as well as the Communists, Italy’s second largest party and main opposition force.
the vote on the Communist-backed motion on the PLO, however, split the coalition and saw the Communists voting with the majority in a 191-116 decision, with 133 abstentions.
The motion commits the government to support the incontestable representation of the PLO as interlocutor in negotiations aimed at putting an end to the Arab-Israeli conflict. It also calls for Palestinian “self-determination respecting, on the part of all, the right of the State of Israel to existence and security.”
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