Abu Mazen announces an end to all agreements with the US and Israel

2020-05-20T08:19:03.347Z

 The Palestinian president, Abu Mazen, announced the end of all agreements with Israel and the United States and said that the former, as an occupying power, is responsible for the territories it occupies. The announcement comes at a time of particular tension, after the Israeli government has announced its intention of annexing part of the occupied territory of the West Bank, as indeed envisaged by the peace plan proposed by Washington in January. "The Organization for the Liberation of Palestine and the State of Palestine are now exempt from all agreements and understandings with the American and Israeli governments and from all the obligations therein, including those of security", reads the presidential declaration , published by the Wafa state agency. Abu Mazen urges Israel to assume its obligations as an occupying power "with all the consequences and repercussions based on international and humanitarian law, in particular the Fourth Geneva Convention". This concerns, he adds, the responsibilities for the safety of the civilian population in the occupied territories and its properties, the prohibition of collective punishment, the theft of resources, the annexation of land and the transfer of population from the occupant to the employed, who "they constitute serious violations and war crimes". The Palestinian president repeated the stark rejection of the U.S. peace proposal and condemned the Trump administration's decision to move the embassy to Jerusalem and recognize the city as the capital of Israel. On the other hand, the Palestinian president repeated his support for an independent, contiguous and sovereign state on the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as capital, and "a just and complete peace based on the two-state solution".