Abbas condemns Israel’s ‘malicious colonial plan’ ahead of Netanyahu UN speech

Benjamin Netanyahu is set to deliver a controversial address to the United Nations on Thursday just hours after Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas said his delegation was “unlawfully” denied visas by the Trump administration to attend the meeting of world leaders.Street protests have already begun in New York City as the Israeli prime minister arrives on a lightning 12-hour visit where he is expected to give a defiant speechin which he will reject criticism over Israel’s war in Gaza and the expansion of settlements in the West Bank.Allies previewing the speech suggested it would read both as an address to his rightwing allies in the United States, as well as a defense of his record as prime minister ahead of October elections that could oust him from power.In a video address from Ramallah, broadcast in the General Assembly Hall, Abbas condemned Israel’s policies in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem as a “malicious colonial plan” to establish a “‘Greater Israel’ and erase the Palestinian presence”.Citing the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the violent expansion of settlements in the West Bank, Abbas said that the Israeli government “now threatens the very life and existence of the Palestinian people in their homeland”.“Do not allow another Nakba and further massacres like those of 1948 to continue taking place,” he added, referring to the expulsion of Palestinians upon the founding of Israel.For the second year in a row, the US state department denied visas to Abbas and the Palestinian Authority delegation, arguing that they had failed to live up to their commitments to seek peace with Israel.“As a consequence of their failure to reform, contrary to their commitments to the United States, and their ongoing activities that undermine the prospects for peace, the United States will extend sanctions that deny visas to PLO members and PA officials,” the state department said last week in a statement.In his speech, Abbas said his delegation “[rejects] these unlawful punitive measures, as well as the accusations and justifications on which they were based”.He said: “Preventing the Palestinian delegation from reaching United Nations headquarters is inconsistent with the obligations of the United States as the host country.”As he spoke, protests were already forming on the streets of New York City near the United Nations headquarters in advance of Netanyahu’s arrival before a speech tentatively scheduled for 2pm ET.Hundreds of demonstrators crowded into the street on Manhattan’s east side in midtown and held signs that said “End the Genocide” and wore shirts reading “Fund people not bombs”.Earlier this summer, the mayor, Zohran Mamdani, had said that Netanyahu was “not welcome” in New York, and said he was reviewing whether Netanyahu could be arrested by city police under an international criminal court warrant for his arrest.He has since tempered that stance, saying this week that he wouldn’t attend the protests but promising to protect their “right to [protest] in this city”.Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, said in an interview that he believed Mamdani’s new stance was “too little and too late”.“You know, he set the fire, and now he’s coming to try to calm down the situation,” Danon said ahead of the speech.Netanyahu is not expected to meet Donald Trump, who is in Washington to host the Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, nor with other senior US officials, as he faces growing international condemnation over his hardline stance. Netanyahu has said that he needs to return to Israel quickly because of the election campaign and the holiday of Sukkot, which begins on Friday.Palestinian representatives are calling for diplomatic missions to bring staff for a planned walkout of Netanyahu’s speech to “send a clear message to Netanyahu and his government that no one is willing to aid, abet, or be complicit in its genocide and war crimes and illegal occupation, which all peace-loving states and peoples demand must come to an end”.