The Palestinian Authority, as the representative for the State of Palestine, responded on Tuesday to the Trump administration’s withdrawal from the United Nations cultural agency Unesco, calling it an “unacceptable politicisation”.Â
“Palestine firmly rejects the justifications provided by the United States for its withdrawal, considering them an unacceptable politicisation of Unesco’s work and a failed attempt to deflect attention from the violations committed by Israel, the illegal occupying Power, against heritage, culture, and archaeological sites in Palestine, as well as in other areas such as education, science, media, and the environment,” the statement said.
“The State of Palestine calls on the United States to cease granting Israel impunity in international forums [and] the United States should not bind its own international standing to the crimes and violations committed by Israel,” it added.Â
Otherwise, the statement continued, the Trump administration “would find itself compelled to withdraw from the entire multilateral international system, in order to shield Israel from accountability, thus encouraging it to continue perpetrating its crimes as a rogue state operating outside the framework of international legality”.
Palestine’s membership in Unesco is “to safeguard Palestinian tangible and intangible heritage from violations and from the systematic destruction carried out by Israel, particularly in Jerusalem and throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory,” the statement said.Â
