The state of Palestine

All territorial claims to the Israeli-held West Bank were ceded to the PLO by King Hussein in 1988. In November of the same year at a meeting of the Palestinian National Council in Algiers, Arafat announced the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.

The council also decided to utilize UN Resolutions 242 and 338, together with the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, as the basis for an international peace conference. Then in December of 1988, the United States agreed for the first time to begin direct contact with the PLO.