Occupied West Bank: Arab and Muslim countries denounce Israel’s policy of annexation and colonization to the UN

UN condemnation and accusations of illegal annexation

Arab and Muslim countries have condemnedUnited Nations the new measures adopted by Israel aimed at strengthening its control over the West Bank busy. These measures, approved by the Israeli security cabinet, make it easier for Israeli settlers to purchase land and grant more powers to Israeli authorities to apply their laws to the Palestinian population. According to the Arab countries, they constitute a new step towards an illegal annexation of the territory. The statement was made on behalf of the Arab Group, an umbrella group that brings together Arab member countries of the UN to speak with one voice on major political issues, including Palestine. The group’s representative claimed that these decisions aimed to impose illegal Israeli sovereignty and strengthen settlement activities in the occupied territories.

The Arab Group said that Israel had no sovereignty over the occupied Palestinian territories and that these measures constituted a blatant violation of international law. He warned that they were contributing to escalating violence and instability across the region. Arab countries also stressed that these decisions went against the resolutions of the United Nations Security Councilin particular those which condemn any attempt to modify the legal status and demographic composition of the territories occupied since 1967. They recalled that these policies directly undermined the two-state solution.

They relied on an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justicewho considered that the Israeli presence in the occupied Palestinian territories was contrary to international law and that it must be ended. Arab countries called on the international community to assume its legal and moral responsibilities and act to put an end to these measures. They welcomed the declarations of the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterresrecalling the illegality of Israeli settlements.

They finally established a link between the situation in the West Bank and that of Gaza, which they described as an “ongoing genocide”, in their words. For its part, theOrganization of Islamic Cooperation also condemned the Israeli decisions, believing that they aimed to impose a new reality through colonization and to modify the legal status of the occupied Palestinian territory, including Jerusalem.

Colonization, apartheid and genocide under the cover of impunity

Beyond diplomatic declarations, Israeli policy is a systematic colonial project, based on the dispossession, domination and progressive erasure of the Palestinian people. In the West Bank, the continued expansion of settlements, land confiscations and the existence of two distinct legal systems reflect a fully accepted apartheid regime, where settlers benefit from extensive rights while Palestinians live under permanent, arbitrary and violent military control.

In Gaza, this logic reaches an even more extreme stage. Israel’s war, marked by massive bombings, widespread destruction of civilian infrastructure, humanitarian asphyxiation and overwhelming numbers of civilian casualties, is described by many states and international actors as an ongoing genocide. It is no longer just a question of military operations, but of a methodical destruction of the very living conditions of an entire population.

Faced with repeated warnings from international institutions, Israel continues to act with almost total impunity, openly defying international law and the decisions of international courts. The absence of concrete sanctions transforms this impunity into a license to destroy, and verbal condemnations into meaningless gestures. This situation highlights not only the brutality of Israeli policy, but also the moral and political failure of an international order incapable — or refusing — to protect a people in the face of a policy of colonization, apartheid and destruction that many now describe as genocidal.