With September 20 less than two weeks away, it’s understandable that sentiments are running high. Palestinians have made up their mind: they will campaign for statehood at the United Nations in New York later this month and they where the bid for full member status at the Security Council.

This decision on the part of the PLO has had huge diplomatic repercussions already. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has been in talks with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to stall unilateral action while French Foreign Minister Alain Juppé is attempting to mediate the UN’s response as Germany and the Netherlands will vote against it but Spain has made it more than clear that it sides with the PLO. For the EU, the diplomatic fear is that although there is one union, 27 different votes would confirm just how much they’re lacking to act as one body.
 

A number of news outlets (that weren’t present at the event) reported earlier this week that the PA had launched its official recognition campaign. The images were there to back it: allegedly some 100 Palestinian officials and activists marched their way to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon’s office to deliver a letter urging him to "exert all possible efforts toward the achievement of the Palestinian people's just demands”.

Ammar Hijazi, a senior legal advisor to the Palestinian leadership told France 24 later that day, “if the Palestinian people see the benefit in this action in the UN and they see that it is in their favour, I promise you history will be talking about this before September and after September”.

The ceremony in Ramallah did take place except the Abbas government denied spearheading the move. In an article published by Haaretz, a PLO spokesman said that the letter sent to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's office in Ramallah declaring the launch of a campaign to gain statehood recognition “was not an official Palestinian Authority document but rather a grassroots attempt to garner support ahead of the UN vote in later September”. While another senior official apparently told Haaretz that “the official request will be made in New York, not Ramallah, and issued by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas”, which begs the question did they file or didn’t they?

The most uncomplicated answer would be, no. The official request indeed has to be filed at the United Nations and because Palestinians do not have an international relations mandate, the only entity that can file such a request must be the PLO itself and a date has not yet been set.

Whilst some would believe this was some kind of screw-up, having journalists race out of Jerusalem Thursday to cover the march and letter-handing in Ramallah was a brilliant PR stunt. Why? It showed that Palestinians back the unilateral act by the PA and to warn the West that they will not be deterred from the September 20 bid.

Romina Ruiz-Goiriena and Gallagher Fenwick
Paris/ Ramallah