A French and Saudi-backed conference on a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will take place from June 17 to 20 at UN headquarters in New York, a French diplomatic source told AFP.
The conference will be organised by the UN General Assembly under a shared French and Saudi presidency, the diplomat told AFP on condition of anonymity.
Nearly 150 countries recognise the State of Palestine, which has observer status at the United Nations but is not a full member as the Security Council has not voted to admit it.
In May 2024, Ireland, Norway and Spain took the step of recognising a Palestinian state but other European governments, including France, have not.
President Emmanuel Macron said in April that France could recognise a Palestinian state in June.
Macron said at the time that he wished to organise the New York conference to encourage recognition of the State of Palestine, “but also a recognition of Israel from states that currently do not”.
The United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco normalised relations with Israel under the Abraham Accords, signed in 2020 during US President Donald Trump’s first term.
But many Arab countries have yet to join the agreement, particularly Saudi Arabia, as well as Israeli neighbours Syria and Lebanon.
Even before the start of the war in Gaza, sparked by Hamas’s October 2023 attack, Saudi Arabia had rejected the normalisation of ties with Israel without the creation of a Palestinian state.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government is firmly opposed to any such move.
Several of his ministers have called in recent months for Israel to annex the West Bank, a Palestinian territory it has occupied since 1967.
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