Jakarta. Indonesia recently urged the United Nations (UN) to conduct a vote on granting full membership to Palestine which is still assuming a non-member observer status to this day.

Speaking before the UN General Assembly, Foreign Affairs Minister Retno Marsudi said that a full membership would put Palestine on equal standing as Israel which already gets a seat at the international organization. This is pivotal to move towards the negotiation process for a two-state solution that envisions Israel and Palestine living side by side as two independent states.

“Addressing the question of Palestine requires us to address the root causes. Plain and simple. The occupation of the Palestinian land must end. There is no military solution to this conflict,” Retno said at the UN General Assembly in New York on Tuesday local time.

“A political solution is the only answer. We need a credible negotiation process that is transparent and equitable with Palestine and Israel having equal standing as UN full members, leading to a two-state solution based on internationally agreed parameters,” Retno said.

Palestine’s non-member observer status means it can speak at General Assembly meetings, but cannot cast votes on resolutions. Israel became the UN's 59th member in 1949. Last month, Israel voted against a resolution that called for a sustained humanitarian truce in the war-battered Gaza. Even so, the resolution still passed by a landslide.

A full membership requires a prior recommendation from the UN Security Council. Palestine will need nine affirmative votes out of 15 members in the Security Council, provided that none of its five permanent members -- China, France, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Russia -- vote against the application. The United States has become one of the biggest roadblocks for Palestine to attain a full membership. If Palestine gets the Security Council’s approval, the UN General Assembly will hold a vote. A two-thirds majority vote is necessary to admit Palestine into the UN.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas recently demanded for Palestine to get a full-fledged member status.

“I call for the State of Palestine to be admitted to full membership in the UN. There are two states that the entire world is talking about: Israel and Palestine. But only Israel is recognized. Why not Palestine?” Abbas said in his speech to the UN General Assembly in September.

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