Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas plans to meet with President Mohamed Morsy in Cairo on Tuesday as part of a tour to shore up international support for UN recognition of Palestine as a “non-member state.”
Palestinian Authority Foreign Minister Riyad al-Malki said that Abbas would travel to Switzerland and France the next day.
Malki commended Egypt’s support for Palestinian efforts, noting that Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Kamel Amr instructed all Egyptian ambassadors abroad to mobilize international support for the Palestinian position.
He added that President Barack Obama called Abbas on Monday to pressure him not to demand the status upgrade from “observer entity” to “observer state,” which would enable the Palestinians to access bodies such as the International Criminal Court.
Hamas, the Islamic Jihad and other resistance groups in Gaza are against the move, which they call an “individual” decision.
Israel also opposes Abbas’s efforts and says negotiations are the only way to establish a Palestinian state. It has threatened to stop collecting tax revenues for the Palestinian Authority and not to hand over funds in its possession if Abbas does not drop the initiative.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
