UNITED NATIONS — In a pre-recorded address played before the UN General Assembly on Thursday, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas knocked the US President Donald Trump’s administration for preventing him from attending the forum in person for the second year in a row.

Last week, the US announced that it was extending last year’s ban on Palestinian officials, arguing that Ramallah had violated US legislation that penalizes the PA if it targets Israel in international organizations, advances the unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state, pays stipends to terrorists or glorifies violence.

“We reject these unlawful punitive measures, and we reject the accusations and justifications on which they were based,” Abbas said. “We affirm that we have fulfilled our obligations, carried out a comprehensive national reform program, and upheld our commitment to international law, to shunning violence and terrorism,” the PA leader argued.

In his roughly 22-minute speech, Abbas bitterly criticized Israel for its policies against the Palestinians, insisting that Ramallah has completed the reforms demanded by the international community and recommitted to a two-state solution with a demilitarized Palestinian state alongside Israel.

Taking issue with the US visa ban, Abbas said the PA shouldn’t be punished for backing efforts to target Israel at the UN, the International Court of Justice, and the International Criminal Court, calling the strategy a “peaceful choice.”

He said the Trump administration’s ban violated US obligations as UN host country. Washington argues that it is allowed to restrict visas on national security grounds, but it decided to allow top officials from Iran, despite the ongoing conflict against the Islamic Republic.

After the brief opening section lamenting the US policy against the PA, Abbas spent most of the rest of his speech criticizing Israel.

He accused it of launching a “genocidal war” against Palestinians in Gaza.

While Abbas has previously condemned Hamas’s October 7, 2023, onslaught that sparked the war three years ago, he made no mention of the Palestinian terror group in his speech at the UN General Assembly.

He also called out Israeli settlement expansion and “settler terrorism [that] is escalating under the protection of the occupation forces.”

Abbas then warned that “Jerusalem is being isolated and Judaized” — an accusation he has made in the past, which Israel argues is a demonstration of his refusal to recognize Jewish ties to the Holy Land.

The PA president went on........

© The Times of Israel