NPR has details: U.N. Votes to Give Palestinians ‘Non-Member Observer State’ Status.

Exactly 65 years after the General Assembly, convened at Lake Success, New York, voted to divide Palestine between a Jewish state and an Arab one, the same body voted 138 to 9 in favor of recognizing the State of Palestine.

The United States and Israel voted against the measure, while France and Spain voted in favor. Great Britain and Germany, both major powers and important U.S. allies, abstained from the vote.

As Mark reported earlier, this vote gives Palestinians the same status as the Vatican, but perhaps more importantly, it gives Palestinians access to other U.N. bodies like the International Criminal Court, where Palestinians could launch complaints against Israel.

The United States has repeatedly said that this was not the right way toward a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“This resolution is not going to take [Palestinian’s] closer to statehood,” Victoria Nuland, a spokeswoman for the State Department, said in a briefing yesterday. “It does nothing to get them closer to statehood, and it may actually make the environment more difficult.”

The resolution reaffirms the “the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, including the right to their independent State of Palestine,” and also declares the Palestine Liberation Organization the “representative of the Palestinian people.”

As delusional diplomats continue pushing for a Palestinian state living in peace next to Israel (a state that might be named “Fantasyland,” with apologies to Walt Disney), “moderate” Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas rejects calling Israel a Jewish state.

JERUSALEM — The Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas, on Monday dismissed a demand by Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, underscoring the considerable gaps between the sides.

“I do not accept it,” Mr. Abbas said in a speech in Ramallah, in the West Bank. “It is not my job to give a description of the state. Name yourself the Hebrew Socialist Republic — it is none of my business,” he added, according to Reuters.

Have you ever seen a people more deserving of statehood?

Also see:
Soccer Dad’s comments, with links to other blogs discussing the story: What’s a jewish state got to do with it?

President Bush is keeping up his game face, even though he must know it’s never going to happen: Bush says he’s confident about creation of Palestinian state.

But the real howler of the day is the ludicrous second sentence of this Associated Press report:

WASHINGTON - President Bush sought Thursday to inject some confidence into the flagging Mideast peace process, pledging that the contours of a Palestinian state can still be reached before he leaves office. But old obstacles, mainly disputed West Bank settlements, continue to threaten that prospect.

Yes, the real problem is those Israeli settlements.

Not the ongoing rocket attacks, not the suicide bombers, not the indoctrination of children, not the idolization of murderers, not the constant barrage of antisemitic propaganda, not the funding from Saudi Arabia for terrorism, not the jihad clerics preaching genocidal hatred.

It’s those settlements.

This is what became of the “amnesty” deal that Israel made with West Bank terrorists: Al Aqsa militants break out of West Bank prison.

“Break out?” Apparently, they walked out, and no one tried very hard to stop them.

NABLUS, West Bank (AFP) - Twelve Palestinian militants escaped from a Palestinian-run prison in the northern West Bank city of Nablus overnight, Palestinian security officials said on Saturday.

The detainees, members of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, an armed group loosely tied to Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas’s Fatah party, were wanted by the Israeli army, the officials said. They had been detained in the Jneid prison under a July 2007 agreement with Israel that allows militants to surrender their weapons and serve a three-month period of detention in exchange for amnesty.

“We left the prison because of the aggression on the part of masked members of the national security forces against the detainees. There were scuffles and then we left,” one of the detainees, Mahdi Abu Ghazaleh, told AFP.

This is a good demonstration of the utter contempt Palestinians have for an international community that never holds them to account for anything: they don’t even try to come up with a good story. Because they know they don’t need to.

This charade long ago passed the point of being darkly amusing; now it’s just flat-out pathetic: Cheney: `Painful concessions’ for peace.

RAMALLAH, West Bank - A Mideast peace agreement will require “painful concessions” by Israelis and Palestinians who must work together to defeat those “committed to violence,” Vice President Dick Cheney said Sunday.

After meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Cheney stressed the U.S. commitment to the creation of an independent Palestinian state, saying it was “long overdue.”

“Achieving that vision will require tremendous effort at the negotiating table and painful concessions on both sides,” said Cheney, whose stop in Ramallah came just two months after President Bush’s trip to the West Bank.

“It also will require a determination to keep those who are committed to violence and who refuse to accept the basic right of the other side to exist,” Cheney said.

Abbas, a moderate, controls the West Bank and is battling Hamas militants who have taken charge of the Gaza Strip from Abbas-allied forces and have bombarded southern Israel with rockets.

“Terror and violence do not merely kill innocent civilians, they also kill the legitimate hopes and aspirations of the Palestinian people,” Cheney said.

The last poll of Palestinian civilians showed that more than 80% support continued attacks on Israel. “Terror and violence” are “the hopes and aspirations of the Palestinian people.”

The mainstream media are back at it again today, promoting a completely phony moral equivalence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. After terrorists launched more rockets into Israel, trying to commit random mass murder, Israel struck back—and the news reports are full of garbage headlines like this: Warplanes, rockets end Gaza lull.

The New York Times dispenses with any sort of balance whatsoever and goes with straight-ahead Palestinian propaganda: Israeli Raid in West Bank Imperils Talk of Truce.

And the UN Secretary General is eagerly pandering to the antisemitic, terror-supporting Organization of the Islamic Conference: UN chief condemns Israeli attacks.

DAKAR (AFP) - UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on Thursday condemned Israel’s attacks on Palestinian civilians in a speech to a summit of Muslim leaders here.

Ban said Israel had employed “inappropriate and disproportionate use of force” in its renewed attacks on the Palestinian territories and called for an immediate ceasefire by both sides.

Highlighting the deaths of women and children in the Israeli attacks he said, “I condemn these acts and call on Israel to cease them” in his speech to the Organisation of the Islamic Conference summit.

It never stops. There’s a bad craziness loose in the world.

The two-faced, fake “moderate,” terror-supporting leader of Fatah (the “political wing” of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades) is, in the words of al-Reuters, “demanding peace.”

The propaganda is shameless, and not just on Abbas’ part. Reuters is openly shilling for this rotten creature.

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called on Saturday for talks with Israel despite a surge of violence and said that a just peace was his people’s goal.

“We condemn all the attacks, we demand peace and we are determined to make peace, and there is no other path but the path of peace based on international justice,” Abbas told a rally at his headquarters.

UPDATE at 3/9/08 10:10:38 am:

And remember, this is the same duplicitous liar who said recently that he was proud of the Palestinians’ past terrorism, and wouldn’t rule out using terrorism in the future. In an Arabic newspaper, where he thought the infidels wouldn’t see it.

As usual, when Palestinian sneak attacks get too brazen and Israel strikes back, the brave jihad warriors turn into whiny crybabies.

And the media immediately start propagandizing for all they’re worth.

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) - Palestinians threatened Saturday to call off peace talks with Israel after 35 Gazans, at least half of them civilians, were killed in pitched battles between Israeli troops and rocket squads that escalated sharply.

Israeli troops, backed by tanks and aircraft, went after militants who bombarded southern Israeli communities near Gaza with rockets and mortars. The 35 deaths pushed the Palestinian death toll to 65 since fighting flared Wednesday. More than half of those killed were civilians.

The spike in violence came as Israel was threatening to launch a broad invasion of Gaza, and just days before Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was to arrive in the region on her latest peacekeeping mission.

Chief Palestinian negotiator Ahmed Qureia said Palestinian leaders, including President Mahmoud Abbas, recommended suspending peace talks at a meeting Saturday in the West Bank town of Ramallah.

“I think it will be suspended,” Qureia said. “What is happening in Gaza is a massacre of civilians, women and children, a collective killing, genocide,” Qureia added. “We can’t bear what the Israelis are doing, and what the Israelis are doing doesn’t led the peace process any credibility.”

Notice: this is Fatah, whining about Israel cracking down on Hamas, even though Fatah and Hamas are pretending to be enemies.

Here’s Israel’s “partner in peace,” so-called “moderate” Fatah president Mahmoud Abbas, in some amazingly unguarded—meaning truthful—statements to a Jordanian daily: Abbas: ‘Armed resistance not ruled out’.

PA President Mahmoud Abbas on Thursday said that he does not rule out returning to the path of armed “resistance” against Israel and took pride in the fact that he had been the first to fire on Israel and that his organization had trained Hizbullah.

In an interview with the Jordanian daily al-Dustur, Abbas said that he was opposed to an armed struggle against Israel - for the time being.

“At this present juncture, I am opposed to armed struggle because we cannot succeed in it, but maybe in the future things will be different,” he said.

The PA president also expressed pride both in himself and in his organization, Fatah, for trailblazing the path of resistance.

“I had the honor of firing the first shot in 1965 and of being the one who taught resistance to many in the region and around the world; what it’s like; when it is effective and when it isn’t effective; its uses, and what serious, authentic and influential resistance is,” Abbas said.

“It is common knowledge when and how resistance is detrimental and when it is well timed,” he added. “We (Fatah) had the honor of leading the resistance and we taught resistance to everyone, including Hizbullah, who trained in our military camps.”

“Gall” does not even begin to describe this outrageous little stunt: Palestinians to report Israeli roadmap violations to US: official.

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AFP) - The Palestinians will present monthly reports to the US listing any Israeli violations of the international roadmap peace blueprint, prime minister Salam Fayyad said on Wednesday.

The reports will also list measures taken by the Palestinian Authority to comply with the peace plan, he told journalists in Ramallah.

Got that? They’ll report violations by Israel, and measures toward compliance by themselves. I’m guessing the latter category will be … skimpy.