Abbas refuses to drop UNSC vote

Outgoing Palestinian Authority Chief Mahmoud Abbas

Source: Press TV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/165890.html

Acting Palestinian Authority Chief Mahmoud Abbas has rejected Washington's request to withdraw a resolution demanding Israel halt settlement activities.

Abbas on Friday rejected a White House proposal to abandon a UN Security Council vote against Israeli settlement expansion on the occupied Palestinian territories and accept instead a non-binding statement. The non-binding statement would call on Tel Aviv regime to freeze its settlement construction activities, AFP reported.

"There is no change in the Palestinian and Arab position about the proposal presented to the UN Security Council condemning Israeli settlement on Palestinian lands," a statement released by Abbas' office on Friday read.

According to a senior Palestinian official, US President Barack Obama had warned Abbas to back off from the Security Council vote on Israeli settlements.

"President Obama threatened on Thursday night to take measures against the Palestinian Authority if it insists on going to the Security Council to condemn Israeli settlement activity, and demand that it be stopped," the official said on condition of anonymity.

He added, "There will be repercussions for Palestinian-American relations if you continue your attempts to go to the Security Council and ignore our requests in this matter, especially as we suggested other alternatives."

American officials have said repeatedly that the Security Council is not the place to hash out the issue of illegal Israeli settlements and a veto to stop an anti-Israeli measure is likely.

Israel has been persistently proceeding with the construction of its settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East al-Quds (Jerusalem).

The United Nation has repeatedly condemned Israel for defying international calls to halt its settlement construction activities.

In October 2010, Oscar Fernandez Taranco, assistant UN secretary general for political affairs, criticized Israel for jeopardizing efforts to resolve the impasse in talks with the Palestinian Authority -- negotiations derailed by Israel's refusal to halt its West Bank settlement expansions.

"We have a brief and crucial window to overcome the current impasse. The UN secretary general continues to believe that if the door to peace closes, it will be very hard to reopen," Taranco told the UN Security Council.

Recently, Human Rights Watch's representative Carroll Bogert criticized Tel Aviv for its "systematic discrimination" against Palestinians "merely because of their race, ethnicity, and national origin" and "depriving them of electricity, water, schools, and access to roads."

"While Israeli settlements flourish, Palestinians under Israeli control live in a time warp -- not just separate, not just unequal, but sometimes even pushed off their lands and out of their homes," Bogert said.

Palestinians view Israel's unrelenting settlement construction activities as a major hurdle smothering their efforts to establish an independent state on the territories Israel captured in the 1967 Six-Day War.