The Executive Committee Palestine Liberation Organization, decided at its meeting in Ramallah on Saturday night to call on the Palestinian Authority government to “disengage” from Israel.
According to the official WAFA news agency, the Executive Committee was chaired by Palestinian Authority and Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas. The PLO is also still headed by Abbas, but nominally headed by PA diplomat Saeb Erekat, who was appointed by Abbas two and a half years ago to be PLO secretary-general.
The committee said in a statement that it asked the government to begin devising plans to disengage from the Israeli occupation authorities at the political, security, economic and administrative levels and to submit the plans to the Executive Committee for approval.
The plans will also “define security relations between the Palestinians and the Israeli occupation and will seek to free the Palestinians from the constraints of the Paris Economic Protocol,” according to WAFA.
“The Executive Committee also decided to form a higher committee to implement the decisions of the Palestinian Central Council, including the decision to suspend the recognition of the State of Israel until the latter recognizes the State of Palestine on the 1967 borders, repeals the decision to annex East Jerusalem and halts settlement activities,” WAFA reported.
Abbas is scheduled to appear before the United Nations Security Council on February 20 in an attempt to persuade the world body to accept the PA as a new independent, sovereign Arab country without direct final status talks with Israel.