Palestine was finally admitted to UNESCO on October 31, 2011. Membership in the Convention becomes active three months after ratification. The new member will be able to submit nominations of sites for inscription on the World Heritage List.
The World Heritage Committee inscribes sites it believes to be of “outstanding universal value” upon the recommendation of the two advisory bodies for cultural heritage and natural heritage, the International Council on Monuments and Sites or the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. Nominations must be submitted by State Parties before 1 February every year if they are to be examined during the Committee session the following year.
Legal and management provisions are required in nominations to ensure their conservation. 21 member State Parties made up the intergovernmental body of the Committee elected by an assembly of all States Parties to the World Heritage Convention.
Established in early 1998, the UNESCO office in Ramallah has been implementing projects to preserve cultural heritage in Palestine. In 2002, the potential “outstanding universal value” of the Palestinian heritage were recognized by the World Heritage Committee and asked the UNESCO Secretariat to help the Palestinian Authority protect it, which eventually led to the World Heritage Committee’s funding of the inventory preparation on Palestine’s cultural and natural heritage sites. WHC has also funded certain conservation projects for sites included in the inventory. The inventory was not official since Palestine was not yet a signatory to the World Heritage Convention when it was prepared.
All States Parties must present the World Heritage Committee with a Tentative List of sites they intend to nominate one year before nominations are submitted.