Year 2023 May See Dramatic Turn in Israel’s Favor at UN – Reports

14:34 25.12.2017(updated 14:35 25.12.2017) Get short URL

If the trend following last Thursday’s vote at the UN General assembly holds on, in a mere 14 years’ time Palestinians will no longer enjoy the support of a staggering half of the 193-strong international body.

According to a breakdown of how countries in the UN voted regarding Jerusalem on December 21, Israel is increasingly backed by Central American states, the Caribbean islands, Africa and Asia, whereas it is quickly losing the support of European states, as compared with the previous vote in 2012, the Jerusalem Post reported.

Back then the UN body was speaking out on whether to admit Palestine as a non-member observer state in the UN. A total of 138 states, which makes up 71.5 percent of the General Assembly, supported Palestinians, and another 55 abstained. This time, however, the number of pro-Palestine states has dropped to 128, or 66.3 percent of the body, which means Israel has grown 5 percent stronger.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose foreign policy has lately focused on boosting diplomatic ties with Africa, Latin America and Asia, told CNN over the weekend that it may “take about 10 years before the absurd automatic majority against Israel may change.” 

The Caribbean is one of the regions that have demonstrated significant headway along these lines. The percentage of the 13 Caribbean states that voted against Israel has plummeted from 77 to only 38.

READ MORE: Israel in Talks With Several States on Embassy Transfer to Jerusalem — Netanyahu

Central America is closely following the Caribbean region in terms of tilting towards Israel: in 2012, six of the eight countries voted against Israel, whereas this year, only three did so. Suggestively, Mexico has demonstrated a shift from voting pro-Palestine to abstaining, and both Guatemala and Honduras have sided with Israel and the US. Moreover, following in the footsteps of the US, Guatemalan President Jimmy Morales also voiced the country’s intention to begin moving its embassy to Jerusalem.

Nevertheless, Europe has significantly distorted the bright-looking picture for Israel.  

As compared to 2012, the percentage of pro-Palestine EU states has spiked from 50 to a staggering 78.5 percent, which this time, most importantly, included Germany, the Netherlands, Lithuania and Slovakia. Similarly, Israel has made no progress among non-EU European countries. Back in 2012, only eight of the 17 non-EU European countries, or 47 percent, sided with the Palestinians; this year the number amounted to as much as 76 percent.

On December 21, the UN General Assembly voted in favor of a resolution that slams Trump’s bid to move the US embassy from Tel-Aviv to the ancient city of Jerusalem, with a total of 128 member states voting for it. Nine countries cast their vote against the resolution and 35 countries abstained.