Legal Pathways to Palestinian Statehood: An Analysis under the United Nations Charter and Article 4

Abstract

This article explores the legal means of Palestinian statehood with reference to the United Nations Charter, with specific emphasis on Article 4 and the process of admission of new members to the United Nations. The article will analyze the changing status of Palestine, from its Declaration of Independence in 1988 to its status as a non-member observer state in 2012, and the recent applications for membership in 2024. This article will address the declaratory and constitutive theories of statehood, the Montevideo criteria, and the role of collective recognition in the context of the United Nations framework. The article will also analyze the role of the 2024 International Court of Justice Advisory Opinion on Palestinian Sovereignty and the legal hurdles created by the Oslo Accords, the role of the United States veto, and the Israeli occupation. This article will contend that, despite the objective criteria for statehood, the political hurdles in the Security Council hinder the Palestinian quest for United Nations membership, revealing the contradiction between the universalist ambitions of the United Nations Charter and the realpolitik of great power politics.