“We said in the past and we still say that our choice is negotiation, negotiation and nothing but negotiation. But if nothing happens by September, we would go to the UN,” Abbas said during a meeting of Palestinian leadership at the Presidential compound of Al-Muqata’a in Ramallah.
Abbas was speaking at a joint meeting of the executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization and Fatah’s Central Committee called to discuss Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to the US Congress and President Barack Obama’s Middle East policy speech.
Abbas said: “Appealing to the UN is not the only plan and we have no intention of isolating Israel or de-legitimizing it.”
Obama reacted to Abbas’ remarks by saying a Palestinian drive for national recognition at the UN would be a “mistake.” “The only way we are going to see a Palestinian state is if Israelis and Palestinians agree on a just peace,” Obama said at a joint news conference in London with British Prime Minister David Cameron.
“I strongly believe for the Palestinians to take the United Nations route rather than the path of sitting down and talking with the Israelis is a mistake.”
In his Ramallah speech, the Palestinian president said that Netanyahu “did not say anything that we can build on positively.” Netanyahu’s speech was “negative” as it attempted to lay down solutions to disagreements even before negotiations have started.
In his Tuesday’s speech, Netanyahu said that while Israel would be “generous” with the size of a Palestinian state, there would be no Israeli return to the borders that existed in June 1967 (before Israel captured the West Bank and East Jerusalem) and Jerusalem would not be divided.
Netanyahu also said Israel will not allow the return of Palestinian refugees and that it should retain a presence along the Jordan River.
Separately, senior Israeli officials will inaugurate a new Jewish settlement in East Jerusalem’s neighborhood of Ras Al-Amoud, Israel’s Radio said on Wednesday.
The report said that Knesset speaker Reuven Rivlin, Education Minister Gideon Sa’ar, Environmental Protection Minister Gilad Erdan, Interior Minister Eli Yishai, Science and Technology Minister Daniel Hershkowitz and Jerusalem’s Mayor Nir Barkat will attend inauguration of Ma’aleh Zeitim settlement later on the day.
“You are invited to come rejoice in the joy of Jerusalem on the occasion of the inauguration of the Ma’aleh Zeitim neighborhood on the Mount of Olives, and to strengthen Jewish settlement in Jerusalem,” read an invitation sent out to attendees.
According to the report, the new settlement will house 110 Jewish families. The report said that an adjacent Jewish settlement, Ma’aleh David, still in the planning stages, would add an additional 90 homes to the area, making the combined area the largest Jewish settlement in East Jerusalem.
The Palestinian Authority, Arab countries, US administration and European Union have previously expressed displeasure with Jewish building in Jerusalem.
The Palestine Liberation Organization’s Executive Committee said that the new settlement in East Jerusalem is “new crime perpetrated by the Israeli government.”
The committee added that the Israeli move is “an attempt to resolve the fate of Jerusalem through the de facto policy.”
The PLO said that the Israeli move is “illegal” and “will not change the legitimate status of Palestinian lands occupied in the June 1967 War.”
It added that the approval of the project “proves that the government of (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu complies with the policy of settlers, mainly in East Jerusalem.”
Israel captured East Jerusalem in the June 1967 War, annexed it, and has since built settlements there that are home to more than 200,000 Israelis.
Control over the city has been seen as the most sensitive and thorniest issue of Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Palestinians hope to make East Jerusalem the capital of their future state but the Israel says the city is its eternal capital, despite a previous United Nations resolution giving the city an international status.
