The U.N. General Assembly adopted a resolution Tuesday night calling on its members states to sever all ties with Israel and to suspend all aid to the Jewish state.
The resolution asked that member states cut off all diplomatic, trade and cultural ties to Israel, in order to “isolate it in all fields.”
The vote was 83-21, with 45 abstentions.
The measure was one of 19 resolutions adopted Tuesday during the General Assembly’s annual debate on the Middle East. Most of the measures contained strongly anti-Israel provisions.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry, calling the resolutions a rehash of many past anti-Israel votes, said the measures had “no moral validity.”
The U.N. body voted once more to endorse an international Middle East peace conference under U.N. auspices, to include the Palestine Liberation Organization as an equal participant.
Prior to adopting the resolution, a separate vote was held on a paragraph stating that U.S. aid to Israel has encouraged expansionism and hindered the peace process.
In other actions:
A measure passed reiterating that all Israeli policies and actions geared to annexing territories captured in the 1967 Six-Day War are illegal and violate international law.
Saying Israel’s record, policies and actions “confirm that it is not a peace-loving member state,” the resolution declared illegal Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights, saying it threatened international peace and security.
Israel captured the Golan Heights from Syria in 1967 and annexed it in 1981.
‘HASN’T DAMAGED ISRAEL’
The General Assembly declared once more that the question of Palestine is at the root of the conflict in the Middle East.
The assembly condemned Israel for arming settlers in the administered territories, in order to commit acts of violence against Palestinian and Arab civilians.
The assembly urged the Security Council to consider according international protection for the Palestinian people until Israel withdraws from the administered territories.
The vote on this measure was 106 in favor, with only two nations, Israel and the United States, opposing. There were 43 abstentions.
The assembly asked for Israeli acknowledgment and compliance with the Geneva Convention on the Protection of Civilians in Time of War in the territories Israel has administered since 1967.
Only Israel voted against the measure, with 148 nations in favor. The United States abstained on this vote. The other nations abstaining were Zaire, Ivory Coast and Liberia.
The assembly voted that Israeli actions taken to change the legal status, geographic definition and demography of the administered territories are in violation of the Geneva Convention, constituting a serious obstacle to Middle East peace.
There were 149 votes in favor of the measure, with only Israel opposing. The United States and Liberia abstained.
The U.N. body deplored Israel’s alleged arbitrary detention or imprisonment of thousands of Palestinians, and it called for their release.
Israel and the United States voted against the measure, with 150 nations in favor.
At the close of the session, Johanan Bein, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, called the focus on the Arab-Israeli conflict misplaced.
He said that the major issue in the Middle East is “the Arab world itself — torn, disunited, working at cross purposes.”
Barukh Binah, a spokesman for the Israeli Mission, said none of the resolutions adopted said anything new. “This is the same ritual that we undergo every year. It hasn’t damaged Israel and doesn’t now.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
