• independence from, free association, or integration with an independent state.10 It implies that the Palestinian people have a right to choose their own political destiny,11 through participation in the political decisionmaking process, directly or through a presentative government; and The free pursuit of the people’s economic, social, and cultural development – and the correlated free and unhindered disposal of its natural wealth and resources.12 It is both the right to choose and to exercise decisions, as well as the right to not be deprived of the means of subsistence or suffer the destruction of culture.13 International law additionally recognizes three basic conditions for self-determination: participation, access and contribution to economic, social, and cultural life. 14 Based on these pillars, the exercise of the right to self-determination requires both a people to choose their political status and a territory within which to pursue their economic, social, and cultural development, with the two inextricably linked.15 Pertaining to Palestinian self-determination, exercising this right includes the Palestinian people as defined and recognized under international law with Mandatory Palestine as the territory whereby they exert their political, social, economic, and cultural development. As argued below, the de facto 10 UNGA, Principles Which Should Guide Members in Determining Whether or not an Obligation Exists to Transmit the Information called for under Article 73(e) of the Charter, A/RES/1541, 15 December 1960, Principle VI, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/3b00f0654c.html [1 November 2021]. 11 Ben Saul et al., “Article 1: The Right of Peoples of Self-Determination, Article 25: The Right to Freely Utilize Natural Resources”, in The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), p. 56. 12 ICCPR, art.1(2) in supra 2; ICESCR, art.1(2) & art.25 in supra 2; See also UNGA, Permanent Sovereignty over Natural Resources, A/RES/1803(XVII), 14 December 1962, art.1, available at: https://digitallibrary. un.org/record/57681?ln=en [accessed 1 November 2021]. 13 UNGA, United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, A/RES/61/295, 2 October 2007, art. 8(1), available at: https://www.un.org/development/desa/indigenouspeoples/wp-content/ uploads/sites/19/2018/11/UNDRIP_E_web.pdf [accessed 1 November 2021]. 14 UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, General Comment no. 21, Right of Everyone to Take Part in Cultural Life (art. 15, §1a of the Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights), E/C.12/GC/21, 21 December 2009, available at: https://bit.ly/3k2KjYK [accessed 1 November 2021]. 15 “To confer on a people a right of “free choice” in the absence of more substantive entitlements – to territory, natural resources, etc. – would simply be meaningless. Clearly, the right of self-determination cannot be exercised in a substantive vacuum.” Catrionia Drew, The East Timor Story: International Law on Trial, European Journal of International Law 12, no.4 (2001), p. 663, available at: http://www.ejil.org/ pdfs/12/4/1539.pdf 5