Palestinians to Seek UN Recognition in September

Israeli diplomats are once again pushing vigorously today following the news that the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), frustrated by the lack of peace talks, will go to the United Nations in September seeking recognition as a member state.

Israeli officials have been railing against the notion of statehood for years, insisting it poses a grave threat to Israel and that the Palestinians are “not ready” to be independent of the military occupation. In recent months they have insisted Palestinian statehood would end all peace talks.

Which is an increasingly meaningless threat, given the peace talks have been stalled for nearly a year and Israeli officials have repeatedly ruled out returning to talks over various other perceived slights in the meantime. Palestinian officials, rather, say they believe statehood would make talks easier, as the two sides would go into the matter on a more equal footing.

This assumes, of course, that statehood is even possible. Israel is pushing for opposition to the statehood, and while they don’t seem to be making much progress it seems a good bet that the Obama Administration will veto it. Whether it is even theoretically possible to override that veto remains a subject of serious debate.