RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister on Friday announced an “international alliance” to press for Palestinian statehood, on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly.

Prince Faisal bin Farhan said the “International Alliance to implement the two-state solution” included Arab and Islamic countries, as well as European partners, the Saudi Press Agency said.

The Gaza crisis has revived talk of a “two-state solution” of Israeli and Palestinian states living in peace side by side, but analysts said the goal seems more unattainable than ever.

The hard-right Israeli government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu remains implacably opposed to Palestinian statehood.

Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil exporter, paused US-brokered talks on recognising Israel after the Israeli invasion of Gaza in October last year.

Earlier this month, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman toughened his tone, explicitly saying that an “independent Palestinian state” is a condition for normalisation.

A senior official of the Saudi-based Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) said the new coalition “consists mainly of Islamic and Arab members of OIC plus some European countries”.

“There will be meetings in Arab and European countries to discuss the practical execution of the initiative and a conference later this year in Riyadh,” added the official, who asked to remain anonymous.

Prompting Israeli anger, Ireland, Norway and Spain announced their recognition of a Palestinian state in May. Slovenia followed, bringing the number of countries that recognise a Palestinian state to 146 out of the 193 United Nations member states.

Prince Faisal said the nearly year-long Gaza conflict could not be justified by Israel as “self-defence”.

“Self-defence cannot justify the killing of tens of thousands of civilians, the practice of systematic destruction, forced displacement (and) the use of starvation as a tool of war,” Prince Faisal told a ministerial meeting on the Palestinian crisis, on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.

Published in Dawn, September 28th, 2024