Members of the Security Council were holding private consultations today on the resumption of the debate which began Monday on Palestinian rights. A spokesperson for the UN could not say this morning when the debate is likely to resume.
The Palestine Liberation Organization and its supporters initiated the debate, pressing the Council to vote on the issue of Palestinian statehood despite the fact that the United States is virtually certain to veto such a resolution.
Addressing the Council Monday, Yehuda Blum, Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, charged that “this debate was initiated and timed to try and frustrate the ongoing peace process in the Mideast.” He said that the PLO and its supporters initiated the debate to sabotage the autonomy talks and the upcoming peace talks in Washington between President Carter and President Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Premier Menachem Begin of Israel.
As for the PLO’s campaign to have the Council support the creation of an independent Palestinian state, Blum said that a Palestinian Arab state has been in existence since 1946. “Two states have been established on the territory of the former Palestine Mandate,” Blum declared. “One is the Palestinian Arab state of Jordan, which achieved national self-determination, independence and sovereignty in 1946. The other is the Palestinian Jewish State of Israel which became independent in 1948.”
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