(United Nations) – The UN General Assembly has voted overwhelmingly to recognize Palestine as a non-member state, handing a major triumph to president Mahmud Abbas in the face of fierce US and Israeli opposition. Abbas has at multiple sessions of the Assembly demanded United Nations to give a “birth certificate” to a Palestinian state. 138 countries voted in favor of his demand, nine against it and Forty-one abstained.
Even though it is not a full member it can now join UN agencies and potentially join the International Criminal Court. Abbas, who embraced his foreign minister after the vote and was given standing ovations, said the vote was “the last chance to save the two-state solution.”