Abbas Addresses UN General Assembly by Video After US Visa Denial
Mahmoud Abbas addressed the UN General Assembly via prerecorded video after the US denied him a visa for the second consecutive year.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas addressed the United Nations General Assembly on Thursday through a prerecorded video, speaking from his office in Ramallah after the United States refused visas to him and other senior Palestinian officials for the second year running.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was set to take the podium in person later in the afternoon.
Abbas, 90, has led the Palestinian Authority since 2005. The body, created under 1990s peace agreements with Israel, administers semiautonomous parts of the occupied West Bank and depends heavily on foreign aid. It is widely recognised internationally as the representative of the Palestinian people.
His domestic standing has eroded over years of corruption allegations and the sometimes violent expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Although a majority of UN member states now recognise Palestine as a country, those diplomatic gains have not altered Israel's long-running military occupation on the ground.
During the war in Gaza, Abbas and the Palestinian Authority have been largely excluded from negotiations over the enclave's future, which have instead been steered by a transition process led by President Donald Trump's Board of Peace.
The Authority was pushed out of Gaza after Hamas won parliamentary elections in 2006 and seized control violently. Abbas was elected to what was meant to be a four-year term in 2005, and no presidential or legislative elections have been held since 2006.
Israel captured the West Bank and east Jerusalem in the 1967 war, territories the Palestinians seek for a future state. The settlements are regarded by the Palestinians and much of the international community as illegal and an obstacle to a viable, contiguous Palestinian state.
Abbas recorded the video on Wednesday.