The UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Robert Serry, briefed the UN Security Council in New York yesterday on developments in the Middle East in the last month.Serry noted a number of positive trends which he said, “if sustained would offer renewed hope for progress,” according to a statement issued by his office in Jerusalem.
He spoke of the ‘quiet engagement’ between Palestinians and Israelis in the context of the exchange of letters between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“The parties must now also be willing to take the much needed steps to capitalize on the potential for progress,” said Serry, adding that, “the current situation remains fragile and uncertain.”
Failure to grasp current opportunities in the Middle East would not only slow down progress on two-state solution, but would also take the process down the path of one-state solution.
In concluding his briefing to the Security Council the UN Special Coordinator expressed his hope that the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli Government will find a way forward in the coming months, while also reasserting the commitment of the United Nation’s to work for a comprehensive resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Serry’s positive report comes despitef PM Netanyahu’s insistence that Jerusalem will remain undivided and the Israeli Capital, that settlement expansion will continue and that there will be no border along the pre-1967 Green Line, all of which are supported by the ‘international community’ as the basis for the Two-State solution.
