Secretary-General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Yousef Al-Othaimeen told Sky News on Monday that Palestinians need to "think outside the box" in their search for an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Sec.-Gen. of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation Yousef Al-Othaimeen: The Palestinians Need to Think Outside the Box, Try Different Ways to Achieve Peace with Israel, Two-State Solution pic.twitter.com/8GLK0GvFAX
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"One is required to think outside the box in search for peace. I do not think a reasonable person - whether Palestinian, Arab or Muslim - would refuse any initiative to resolve the [Palestinian] cause in any way," he said.
"The [Palestinian] cause has been going on for 70 years. We have tried wars, we have tried to throw Israel into the sea and we have tried many other things," the former Saudi Arabian minister said.
Othaimeen said that the goal of the Palestinian cause is a two-state solution, with east Jerusalem as its capital, and that a younger generation should not be afraid to try new approaches to get there.
"This new generation of our Palestinian brothers should try some ideas that may lead to the resolution of this problem, which is important to all of us and to the Islamic world, but in new ways," he said. "We should try what has not been tried yet in order to bring about a two-state solution, in which east Jerusalem will be the capital of that newborn state."
According to Othaimeen, this is a goal shared by a large portion of the Arab world. "Yesterday, I saw a press conference on Sky News with three important ministers from Iraq, Egypt and Jordan. All three of them emphasized this. The challenge is how to reach that goal," he said.
"What is the point of insisting that there is only one way - the path of boycott and keeping away? There may be ways that are not traditional and have not been tried yet," Othaimeen concluded.This, however, does not mean that the OIC will not accept any offer. In February, the 57-member organization rejected US President Donald Trump's "Deal of the Century," saying that it "calls on all member states not to engage with this plan or to cooperate with the US administration in implementing it in any form."