DECISION ON MIDDLE EAST AND OCCUPIED
PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES
DOC.EX.CL/121 (V)
The Executive Council:
RECALLS all relevant resolutions adopted by the OAU/AU on the question of Palestine and the situation in the Middle East, which affirm that the question of Palestine is the core issue of the Middle East conflict and that no comprehensive just and lasting peace can be established unless Israel fully withdraws from all Palestinian and other Arab territories occupied since June 1967, including East Jerusalem, and enable the Palestinians to exercise their inalienable national rights in accordance with UN resolutions, in particular their right to return to their homes and property, right of self-determination and the right to establish the independent state of Palestine with Al Quds (Jerusalem) as its capital;
REAFFIRMS ITS COMMITMENT to a vision of two states, living side by side, in peace and security;
CONDEMNS Israel, the occupying Power, for using internationally prohibited weapons and excessive force against civilians, and CALLS UPON the Security Council to take appropriate action to stop these measures including by providing the necessary international protection for Palestinian people and for the Christian and Muslim sacred places, and to work towards securing the release of Palestinian prisoners and detainees, including juveniles and women, from Israeli prisons and detention centers;
CONDEMNS FURTHER the Israeli systematic human rights violations and reported war crimes, particularly the assassination of the Palestinian leaders and the willful killings of civilians, including those that recently took place in Rafah and other Palestinian lands;
ALSO CONDEMNS all the acts of violence from whichever side, against the Israeli or Palestinian civilians;
REITERATES ITS SUPPORT to the Arab Initiative for a just and comprehensive peace settlement in the Middle East as adopted by the Summit of the League of Arab States held in Beirut in March 2002;
COMMENDS the Egyptian role aiming at helping to achieve the complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza Strip in the framework of the road map and reaching the withdrawal from all Palestinian territories including East Jerusalem;
EXPRESSES ITS COMMITMENT to a peaceful solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and CALLS ON the international community and the Quartet to undertake the necessary measures to salvage the peace process;
EXPRESSES GRAVE CONCERN about the devastation being cause by the Wall that Israel continues to construct in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, including in and around East Jerusalem, and AFFIRMS that, if completed, the wall will hinder the application of two-states solution. Council CONDEMNS Israeli’s non-compliance with the demand of the Tenth Emergency Special Session of the United Nations General Assembly to stop the construction of the Wall, and to remove the existing parts of the Wall and, in this regard, reiterates the need for the complete cessation of all Israeli colonial settlement activities;
EXPRESSES ITS UNEQUIVOCAL SUPPORT to the Palestinian people and Authority under the leadership of President Yasser Arafat. In this connection, Council DEMANDS an immediate end to the siege imposed against the Palestinian people and the democratically elected President Yasser Arafat, so as to ensure their right to freedom of movement within and outside Palestine;
ENDORSES the setting-up of the Committee of 10 members provided for by decision AHG/Dec. 182(XXXVIII), adopted in July 2002, in Durban, South Africa, by the 38th Assembly of Heads of State and Government, to promote the peace process in the Middle East; the Committee is composed of the following countries: Tunisia, Mauritania, Senegal, Nigeria, Uganda, Ethiopia, Chad, Gabon, South Africa and Mozambique;
APPEALS to AU Member States to participate in the special meeting on Palestine organized in the margins of the United Nations General Assembly Session in September 2004, cosponsored by the African Union and several regional and international organizations.