UNITED NATIONS: Following a request by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal earlier this week, the UN Security Council met yesterday to discuss Israeli settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territories.
At the meeting Prince Saud said that settlement activities by the Israelis “make the creation of a viable Palestinian state impossible.”
Israel authorized last month the construction of hundreds of more Jewish housing units in annexed East Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas were among the speakers. Israel opted out of sending President Shimon Peres. Instead the new Israeli envoy, Gabriela Shalev, took the floor.
Prince Saud said: “Changing the geographic and demographic makeup of the occupied territories is the one issue that threatens to bring down the peace process.”
Kouchner agreed and said building settlements is a major obstacle. “The EU thinks settlements are illegal and they harm the credibility of Israel,” said Kouchner. “There will be no peace without total, immediate halt to settlement activities.”
For her part, Rice urged Arab states to “consider ways they might reach out to Israel” and underscored the fact that Israel “belongs to the Middle East.” She added that the Arab world needed to fully understand that “Israel belongs to the Middle East and will remain” in the Middle East.
In a brief encounter with the press after the Council meeting, Saud said the whole purpose of the meeting was to draw attention to the very important topic of Israel’s policy of continuing to build settlements in occupied territories.
“We all heard all delegations confirming the illegality of those settlements and their threat to the peace process,” said the Saudi foreign minister.
East Jerusalem continues to be the major obstacle in the peace process. While Israel is ostensibly committed to pulling back from most of the West Bank, it stands firm on a united Jerusalem under Israeli sovereignty. On the other side, the Arab states agree that no viable Palestinian state is possible without Jerusalem being its capital.
Prince Saud called for greater participation by the international community to resolve the settlement issue.
Shalev said that Israel does not welcome the initiative to address this topic at the UN Security Council. “Those who initiated the Security Council discussion in the belief that it will contribute to the promotion of peace are wrong,” she said.
Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa said Arabs are not looking for more bloodshed. “We need an honest broker,” he said, adding if the Council does not address the issue, it would be discussed elsewhere anyway.
