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Earlier this week, the United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly, 143 to 9 with 25 abstentions, to support a resolution widening the rights of the Palestinian delegation to the UN and ordering the Security Council to once again revisit the issue of granting full membership to the state of Palestine.
The Biden administration has used a few excuses to explain why it vetoed an earlier resolution on Palestine and announced that it will again cast a negative vote scuttling efforts to provide the Palestinian people with a political horizon.
The White House claims that while it supports a two-state solution, the conditions are not ripe for Palestinian statehood. Ironically, Washington was the first to recognize the state of Israel, doing so on May 15, 1948, long before it had met all the features of statehood. It would take two more years and promises by the new country to respect UN resolutions before it was granted full membership.
The Biden administration also says that Palestinian statehood can only happen as a result of direct talks. This excuse has been repeatedly exposed by Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has refused direct talks and been adamant in his rejection of Palestinian statehood.
But while the Biden administration is offering different excuses, the real reason lies in Congress. Back in 1990, Congress passed a law that would force the administration to stop funding all UN agencies if the world body unilaterally recognized Palestine as a state. Biden, who promised in his 2020 election campaign to restore the Palestinian diplomatic office in Washington and the U.S. consulate in Jerusalem, is refusing recognition because of existing laws. When Democrats controlled both houses, they made no effort to remedy those problems. When Biden visited Bethlehem in 2022, he told the Palestinian president that the time was not ripe for a Palestinian state, and to reject repeated calls for a political horizon for Palestinians.
Now the U.S. is again repeating ad nauseum that it supports a two-state solution. One spokesperson has even said that talks on the issue must begin "expeditiously," even though Israel has shut down talks with Palestinians for a decade.
The closure of all political avenues contributes to the hopelessness of Palestinians. Without serious movement towards an end to the occupation, the anger will further fester. What is needed are steps on the ground that send a strong message that two independent states living next to each other in peace is the solution. Thee are concrete steps Washington can take to show that it means what it says.
While recognizing Palestine would send a strong message, an even more powerful act would be to help Palestinians escape the position of dependency that the decades-long occupation has left them in. President Biden has often talked about dignity for Palestinians. One way to ensure Palestinian dignity would be to help the Palestinian government decouple its dependency on the Israelis and start working on the building blocks of an independent state.
This means ending dependency on Israel for energy and water and allowing Palestinians to dig their own wells and use the potential of gas wells off the Gaza Strip. In the immediate term, Palestinians can benefit from help from their two Arab neighbors, Jordan and Egypt, who already have a peace treaty with Israel. Jordan is already supplying electricity to Jericho; this can be expanded to wean Palestine from needing the Israeli company supplying them with electricity. Border crossings between Palestine and Jordan need to be expanded with at least one more bridge. Adam Bridge north of the existing King Hussein Bridge can be reopened for cargo supplies.
Instead of Israel supervising the borders and collecting taxes and customs, and refusing to deliver them to the Palestinians, an international body should be created to supervise all border crossings and collect customs on behalf of Palestine until the formalities of an independent state can be accomplished.
Palestinians also must be able to carry out all forms of actions that promote state-building and economic independence. Israeli restrictions on land use and the interference of Israeli cell companies should be stopped to allow the two existing Palestinian telecommunications companies—Jawwal and Wataniya—to operate without unauthorized Israeli coemption. Until the status of settlement is resolved, settlers squatting on Palestinian lands in violation of international law can buy subscriptions to the Jawwal and Wataniya cellphone companies if they want to use their cell phones.
The world is watching to see whether President Biden is serious about pursuing a two-state solution. But until he can resolve the legal and congressional roadblocks to formal recognition, there is no reason why he and all America's allies (both Western and Arab) can't invest in the infrastructure needs of a Palestinian state, such as an airport in the West Bank and an expanded port in Gaza.
On Sunday, Israeli troops near Rafah shelled what remained of the Gaza international airport. This attack had no security or strategic reason behind it. It was done merely out of spite and to show that Israel will not support Palestinian sovereignty.
Nothing can help reverse the current trend of hopelessness more than for Palestinians to see other states step in to help begin work on rebuilding a Palestinian airport and other features of statehood. There are limitless opportunities for the United States to support the rights of Palestinians to work toward a two-state solution. But they will require serious political will from the Biden administration and America's allies.
Daoud Kuttab is an award-winning Palestinian journalist and former Ferris Professor of Journalism at Princeton University. He is a columnist with AL-Monitor and Arab News. Follow him on X @daqoudkuttab and Threads @daoud.kuttab
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.
