Next week the Palestinian Authority, stepping away from years of a fruitless "peace process" with Israel, will ask the UN to recognize Palestine as an independent state, says an article in The Guardian.

It is very likely to be obstructed in the security council by the US, Israel's long-suffering but faithful friend. There is no question, however, that an overwhelming majority in the general assembly will back the Palestinians, the article says.

Israel has never looked more isolated as its embassy in Egypt is attacked, and Turkey, another close ally in the region until recently, leads a resurgent pan-Arab anti-Zionism. Its western supporters, too, have been dwindling fast. Besieged at home by furious masses demanding social justice after years of private wealth creation, Israeli leaders find their most devoted friends abroad among centre-right or extreme rightwing politicians in Canada, Italy, Holland and the Czech Republic, all of which are expected to stifle the Palestinian state at birth, it says.

Palestinian politicians remain hopelessly divided. And an independent Palestine might prove tragically unviable, quickly stumbling into the crowded ranks of "failed" or "failing" nation states. Yet Palestine has long been the unfinished business of decolonization and national self-determination: the central events of the 20th century. And opposition from a weakened west next week will not prevent the eventual birth of a Palestinian state – just as objections from the fledgling and powerless nations of the east in 1947 did not thwart the creation of a Jewish state, the article says.