Bethlehem/PNN/

The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) has adopted a resolution declaring that Syrians and Palestinians have sovereignty over their natural resources in the Israeli-occupied tracts of land in the strategic Golan Heights and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

The UNGA passed the resolution on “permanent sovereignty of the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory,” including East Jerusalem, and of “the Arab population in the occupied Syrian Golan over their natural resources” on Wednesday, with 159 votes in favor.

Eight member states, namely Canada, Chad, Israel, the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru, Palau and the United States, voted against, and there were 10 abstentions.

The United Nations said, “By the text, the Assembly demanded that Israel, the Occupying Power, cease the exploitation, damage, cause of loss or depletion and endangerment of the natural resources in the Occupied Palestinian Territory,” including East al-Quds, and in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights.

The resolution also called for the cessation of all acts harmful to the environment, including the actions carried out by Israeli settlers by dumping waste of all kinds in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights and in the occupied Palestinian territories.

The UNGA said such moves pose a serious threat to the natural resources of the population, particularly the resources of water and land, and threaten the environment and the health of civilians and their facilities.

Palestinians want the West Bank as part of a future independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital.

Israel, which captured the territory in 1967 and later annexed it in a move never recognized by the international community, calls Jerusalem its indivisible capital.

More than 600,000 Israelis live in over 230 settlements built since the 1967 Israeli occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

The UN Security Council has condemned Israel’s settlement activities in the occupied territories in several resolutions.

Israel seized the Golan Heights from Syria after the 1967 Six-Day War and later occupied it in a move that has never been recognized by the international community. 

Israel has built dozens of settlements in the area ever since and has used the region to carry out a number of military operations against the Syrian government.