Thailand votes with 143 nations backing full UN membership for Palestine
The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) has overwhelmingly voted in favour of recognising Palestine as qualified for full UN membership and recommended the Security Council to reconsider the matter.
The vote on Friday by the 193-member General Assembly was a global survey of support for the Palestinian bid to become a full UN member — a move that would effectively recognise a Palestinian state — after the United States vetoed it in the UN Security Council last month.
The assembly adopted a resolution with 143 votes in favour, including Thailand, and nine against — including the US and Israel — while 25 countries abstained.
The resolution does not give the Palestinians full UN membership, but simply recognises them as qualified to join.
The resolution "determines that the State of Palestine ... should therefore be admitted to membership" and it "recommends that the Security Council reconsider the matter favourably".
The Palestinian push for full UN membership comes seven months into a war between Israel and Palestinian militants Hamas in the Gaza Strip, and as Israel is expanding settlements in the occupied West Bank, which the UN considers to be illegal.
Thirty-three Thai workers in Israel have been killed since the conflict erupted o October 7, while 18 are being held hostage by Hamas. Thailand is the foreign country with second highest number of fatalities in the ongoing conflict, behind France that lost 35 of its citizens.
