Palestinians to File Complaint over Honduras Jerusalem Move
The Palestinian foreign ministry said Thursday it would file a complaint at the United Nations against Honduras, after the Central American state recognized the disputed city of Jerusalem as Israel's capital.
Israel considers all of Jerusalem as its undivided capital, while the Palestinians see the eastern part of the city as the capital of their future state.
US President Donald Trump recognized Jerusalem as capital of the Jewish state in December 2017, breaking with decades of international consensus that the city's status should be decided in peace talks.
Both Washington and Israel have since encouraged other countries to take similar steps.
So far only Guatemala and Paraguay have transferred their embassies, and Paraguay later reversed its decision.
On Tuesday, Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez announced that his country would open a diplomatic office in Jerusalem.
The mission will be an extension of Honduras' Tel Aviv-based embassy, but Hernandez said Tuesday it was "recognition that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel."
In a statement Thursday, the Palestinian foreign ministry confirmed it would submit a formal complaint against Honduras to the UN's Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
It called the decision a "direct aggression" against the Palestinian people and a "blatant violation of international law and legitimacy."
Israel occupied predominantly Palestinian east Jerusalem in 1967 and later annexed it in moves never recognized by the international community.
Around 200,000 Israelis now live in east Jerusalem in settlements considered illegal by much of the international community.
In a statement, senior Palestinian official Hanan Ashrawi said the leadership would "reassess its relationship with Honduras."
"The status of Jerusalem as an occupied city is endorsed by the vast majority of states, in line with their standing legal and moral obligations to uphold international law," she added.
Hernandez is expected to visit Israel and open the new mission in the coming days.
Ashrawi also condemned the tiny Pacific Ocean island state of Nauru, which recently recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital.
30 August 2019, 07:43
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So, they will complain. Who to? The UN General Assembly, they'll get a vote which has no binding effect whatsoever. The Security Council, big deal, the US will veto it. The only way they may get a positive vote is at UNWRA, which as we all know is even more corrupt than the PA itself.
Will someone please check into not so long ago history and see before 1967 just how many embassies were in Jerusalem them, and we never heard a murmur. Why? Because there was no such thing as Palestine and the Palestinians.
