KEY POINTS
- Indonesia offered to deploy 20,000 troops to Gaza as UN peacekeepers.
- President Prabowo Subianto reaffirmed support for a two-state solution.
- Prabowo urged the UN to act against “genocide” and uphold justice for Palestinians.
UNITED NATIONS: Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto told the UN General Assembly on Tuesday that his country is ready to deploy at least 20,000 troops to Gaza to safeguard any future peace deal, pledging “boots on the ground” to uphold international stability.
Addressing the UN General Assembly, President Prabowo Subianto said that the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country wanted a peace that shows that “might cannot make right.”
“We believe in the UN. We will continue to serve where peace needs guardians — not with just words, but with boots on the ground,” he said.
“If and when the UN Security Council and this great Assembly decide, Indonesia is prepared to deploy 20,000 or even more of our sons and daughters to help secure peace in Gaza,” he said.
He said that Indonesia was also willing to send peacekeepers elsewhere including in Ukraine, Sudan or Libya.
The United States and Arab states have been speaking for months, but to little avail, about a post-war plan in Gaza which has been devastated by two years of Israeli attacks. Over 65,000 Palestinians have been killed in the ongoing Israeli bombardment campaign in Gaza since October 2023.
Independent Palestine
The Indonesian leader appealed for an independent Palestine and peace in the region.
“We must have an independent Palestine, but we must also recognise the safety and security of Israel. Only then we can we have real peace.”
Prabowo reaffirmed commitment to the two-state solution to the Israel and Palestine conflict.
“Indonesia is committed to being part of making this vision a reality. Is this a dream? Maybe, but this is the beautiful dream that we must work together towards.”
The Indonesian President said, “My country knows this pain for centuries. Indonesians lived under colonial domination, oppression and slavery, we were treated less than dogs in our own homeland.”
“We Indonesians know what it means to be denied justice and what it means to live in apartheid, to live in poverty and to be denied equal opportunity, we also knew what can do in our struggle for independence, in our fight to overcome hunger, disease and poverty.”
Prabowo underscored the UN’s role in helping Indonesia secure independence, and then develop, before pivoting to discuss the “genocide and blatant disregard for international law and human decency” witnessed globally today.
“We will never forget and today, we must never be silent while Palestinians are denied that same justice and legitimacy in this very hall,” he said, adding that the UN “exists to reject this doctrine – we must stand for all the strong and the weak.”
