Palestinian Authority officials handed over requests to 15 United Nations bodies on Wednesday, signaling a snub of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and the end of his Peace Talks stage show.
It ain’t so.
As usual, Mahmoud Abbas and his henchmen are playing with words. The PA dramatically announced Tuesday night that its top committee voted unanimously to ask to join 15 United Nations agencies, violating a promise Abbas made to Kerry eight months ago that the PA would not take such unilateral steps during the talks that officially have another four weeks to go.
The official excuse is that since Israel did not come through last with the release of the final batch of terrorists, including card-carrying Israeli citizen-murderers whom the government never promised to free, the PA can do as it pleases.
After Abbas ostensibly pressed “delete” on Kerry’s program, the Secretary of State triumphantly announced, “Let me make it absolutely clear. None of the agencies that President Abbas signed tonight involve the UN. None of them. And President Abbas has given his word to me that he will keep his agreement and that he intends to negotiate through the end of the month of April.”
Either Kerry is again showing he is ignorant, or Abbas is again proving he is a liar, right?
Almost wrong. Kerry showed he is only partly ignorant, and Abbas showed he not a liar but just a con man.
Remember how the Obama administration and the media establishment always mouth off about the Palestinian Authority’s “negotiations” that are NewSpeak for an ultimatum?
Now add “United Nations Agencies” to the list to the New Arab Dictionary of Twisted English.
Following is the list of the 15 U.N. “agencies” that have received the official Palestinian Authority requests to join:
1. The Four Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 and the First Additional Protocol
2. The Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations
3. The Vienna Convention on Consular Relations
4. The Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in armed conflict
5. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
6. The Hague Convention (IV) respecting the Laws and Customs of War on Land and its annex: Regulations Concerning the Laws and Customs of War on Land
7. The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
8. The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties
9. The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination
10. The Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment
11. The United Nations Convention against Corruption
12. The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
13. The International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid
14. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
15. The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
Kerry is right. They are not U.N. agencies. He is wrong because indeed they are connected with the United Nations in one form or another.
They are “treaties” and “conventions” but not agencies, a term reserved for such enlightened institutions as the International Monetary Fund and the World Health Organization.
This is the official list of U.N. agencies:
1. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)
2. International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO)
3. International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD)
4. International Labor Organization (ILO)
5. International Maritime Organization (IMO)
6. International Monetary Fund (IMF)
7. International Telecommunication Union (ITU)
8. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)
9. United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO)
10. Universal Postal Union (UPU)
11. World Bank Group
11.1 International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD)
11.2 International Finance Corporation (IFC)
11.3 International Development Association (IDA)
12. World Health Organization (WHO)
13. World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)
14. World Meteorological Organization (WMO)
15. World Tourism Organization (UNWTO)
16. Former specialized agencies
17. Related Organizations
17.1 Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization Preparatory Commission
17.2 International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
17.3 Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons
17.4 World Trade Organization (WTO)
The Palestinian Authority has not asked to join any of them. It once again is huffing and puffing but not ready to blow the house down. Be patient, because that time will come. If President Barack Obama has his way, it will happen around January 21, 2017, the day after Hillary Clinton, or by some miracle a Republican nominee, will step into the White House.
No one should scoff too much at the PA requests to join the 15 U.N. treaties and conventions because they certainly would give Abbas an entry pass to official agencies. That is the next step, either next month, if Kerry finally gets tired of his games, or next year, or as long as he can write more charters for this black comedy.
For the time, being everything is on hold for a week because that is when the Arab League, which is calling the shots for Abbas, meets to decide the next maneuver.
That gives Obama time to parachute to Earth from outer space, where he dealt the Pollard card to bribe Israel into another immoral release of murders.
Abbas can be satisfied if Israel does not get Pollard. The whole point of this play is not to win anything but just to make sure the other side loses something, and Israeli officials reportedly said Wednesday that Abbas vetoed being part of the Free Pollard movement, unintentionally doing Obama a giant favor.
So what will the Arabs have lost? They will have lost more time, because as every day passes, his deceit and corruption eat away at the Palestinian Authority’s rotten foundations, which will collapse like a Ponzi scheme.