Twenth-ninth session of the GCC Supreme Council – Palestinian issue and Middle East peace process – Final communiqué/Non-UN document (excerpts)

The Final Communiqué of The 29th Session of the Supreme Council
of The Arab Gulf Cooperation Council

Muscat, the Sultanate of Oman
1-2 Muharram 1430 H,
29-30 December 2008

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On the political front

The Palestinian Issue and Middle East Peace Process

The leaders reviewed the current painful events in Gaza Strip, as well as the destruction inflicted by the Israeli killing military machine without heeding any human considerations or international legitimacy laws.

The GCC leaders decided to initiate urgent contacts with UN Security Council's permanent members to urge the international community to bear its responsibilities.

The Supreme Council expressed its grave concern and great disappointment at the flagrant Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people, which led to large number of deaths and injuries as well as the destruction of property and terrifying of innocent people without any deterrence by consciousness or observation of any ethical values, humanitarian considerations or the resolutions of international legitimacy.

The Supreme Council strongly condemns this brutal Israeli aggression and held it responsible for pushing the situation to this serious level because of its obstinate policies and its inhuman practices against the Palestinian people.

The Council requests Israel to refrain from the obstinacy of power, stop punishing the unarmed Palestinian people, and lift the unfair blockade imposed on all Palestinian territories especially Gaza Strip.

It calls upon the international community to bear its full responsibilities and move immediately to halt these massacres and attacks perpetrated by the Israeli killing machine, as well as provide the Palestinian people with the required protection.

The Supreme Council reiterated that the Palestinian national unity is the protective shield of the Palestinian people. It urged all Palestinian factions to speak in one voice during this critical stage in the Palestinian cause, in order to guarantee the territorial integrity of Palestinian people, restore their legitimate rights and establish their independent state with East Jerusalem as its capital.

The Supreme Council reviewed the deterioration of the Middle East peace process as a result of Israeli government's continued blockade of the Palestinian people especially in Gaza, its flagrant defiance of the resolutions of the international legitimacy, the expansion of settlements, the construction of the separation wall and its continued digging works which would destroy Al-Aqsa mosque and change the Arab and Islamic features in Jerusalem.

The Supreme Council called for complete Israeli withdrawal from all the occupied Arab lands in Palestine, the occupied Golan Heights to the June 1967 borders and from the rest of the occupied lands in South Lebanon in accordance with Security Council Resolutions 425 and 426.

In this respect, the Supreme Council expressed the hope that the US President-elect Barak Obama accords top priority in the American foreign policy to the Palestinian problem, and the Middle East peace process in order to fulfill the promises and commitment of the establishment of a viable Palestinian State living in peace and security alongside the state of Israel. The Council urged President Obama to help achieve just and permanent peace in the Middle East region. The Supreme Council stressed the importance of the contents of the message sent to him by the current Chair of the Arab Ministerial Council His Highness Prince Saud Al-Faisal, and the Arab League Chairman HE Amro Mousa, which detailed the Arab position regarding the developments of the Arab Israeli conflict. The message reaffirmed Arabs' willingness to establish just and permanent peace in accordance with the principle of land for peace, UN resolutions, the Arab peace initiative and its requirements.

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