Letter to new Secretary-General of UN António Guterres

Dear Mr. António Guterres,

We know that the mandate that you begin today will be very demanding.

Our planet's problems are dramatic and demand urgent action by the international community.

Perhaps never since World War II have the dangers of a conflict between the biggest nuclear powers on the planet been so great.

For the peoples of the Middle East, the scourge of war is already a terrible reality. The 21st Century has been for them a century of successive wars, imposed or nourished from abroad, as a result of unconfessed ambitions of economic domination.

Entire countries have been, and are being, destroyed and fragmented, their States torn apart. For the peoples, war means death, destruction, forced exile, within their countries or in more distant places. The number of refugees and displaced persons has never been so high since World War II. We know that you are well aware of this reality, because of your worthy work as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

This reality of today's world is unacceptable. It shocks the consciousness of Humanity. It must urgently be ended.

But we urge that, in the midst of so many great problems, the tragedy of the Palestinian people not be forgotten. The United Nations owe a terrible debt to the martyred people of Palestine.

Almost seven decades ago, the UN chose to partition Palestine's historical territory, promising the creation of two States. One of those States, the State of Israel, has existed for 68 years. But the Palestinian people are still awaiting the fulfillment of the promise made by the UN General Assembly, which has been successively renewed through numerous Security Council and General Assembly resolutions that Israel defies daily.

These have been decades of occupation, repression, wars and a permanent campaign of displacement of the Palestinian population from their homes, their lands and their Land.

Decades of negotiations, in which the Palestinian side agreed to make substantive concessions, sacrificing most of its historical territory for the sake of creating a national State with its capital in East Jerusalem, have come to nothing.

Decades of unsuccessful expectations, with countless resolutions, treaties and agreements, have not materialized the State that the Palestinian people yearn for. Millions of Palestinian refugees, scattered all over the world, and the memory of their parents and grandparents, cry out for justice. It is an unacceptable situation, incompatible with the UN's role and Charter. It is an open wound for the status and credibility of the United Nations.

The recently adopted UN Security Council Resolution 2334 may open a path of hope for the realization of the rule of international law and the respect for the inalienable rights of peoples, if blackmail and other maneuvering to prevent its full implementation is stopped.

MPPM — the Movement for the Rights of the Palestinian People and for Peace in the Middle East — is an NGO accredited by the United Nations Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People (Deliberation of September 17, 2009). Its mission is to promote among public opinion, and in accordance with United Nations resolutions, support for the creation, in the territories of Palestine occupied by Israel since 1967, of an independent and sovereign State of Palestine, with a just solution to the question of Jerusalem and for the issue of Palestinian refugees, as well as support for the establishment of a comprehensive and lasting peace in the Middle East.

At the recent event marking the 29th of November, a date which the UN chose as the International Day of Solidarity with the People of Palestine, we expressed our solidarity with the people of Palestine, their cause, the cause of their political prisoners, their millions of refugees, those living under occupation or in exile. This appeal, addressed to you, arose from that event.

We urge that the mandate that you are now beginning, in the very important post of Secretary-General of the United Nations, may be the mandate in which the United Nations may repay their historical debt to the people of Palestine. An act of justice in itself, the solution of the Palestinian people's drama would also be an invaluable contribution to peace throughout the Middle East. That is to say, to peace around the World.

Lisbon, 1st January, 2017

The National Directorate of MPPM