If you’re an American who thinks there is a leadership vacuum on your continent, take a look north of your border; that vacuum may be getting filled in Canada. The Prime Minister there is playing hardball with the Palestinian Authority.
Via Arutz Sheva:
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper personally intervened to pressure Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas to drop his bid for upgraded status at the United Nations.
Harper, who had been in New York to accept an award and attend the opening of a new session of the United Nations at the end of September, had “a short, brusque meeting with [Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud] Abbas,” the Globe and Mail newspaper reported.
“In a little room at the United Nations, Mr. Harper skipped most of the pleasantries in a 15-minute meeting, according to sources briefed on the session, and told Mr. Abbas he had come to deliver a message: If you keep doing what you’re doing, he said – referring to the Palestinian bid for upgraded status – ‘there will be consequences,'” the newspaper reported.
“It was just one part of the bare-knuckle approach Canada has taken toward the U.N. bid, though largely out of public view,” according to the newspaper.
Abbas, who is set to appear before the U.N. General Assembly on Thursday, will be beseeching the international body to grant the Palestinian Authority Observer status, thus enabling it to achieve de facto status as a sovereign state and effectively circumvent final status negotiations with Israel.
The status, if granted, would grant the PA access to the International Criminal Court at The Hague and other similar bodies, which would enable it to pursue “war crime” charges and other grievances against the Jewish state.
h/t Keith