Day after UN Palestine statehood vote, Israel set to expand settlements
Defying a UN vote that boosted Palestinian status in the UN, Israel plans to build thousands of new homes for its settlers in West Bank and East Jerusalem.
A laborer works atop a roof at a construction site in the West Bank Jewish settlement of Maale Adumim near Jerusalem in this June file photo. Israel plans to build 3,000 new homes for its settlers in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, defying a UN vote that implicitly recognized Palestinian statehood there.
Ronen Zvulun/Reuters/File
Jerusalem
Israel聽plans to build thousands of new homes for its settlers in the occupied West Bank and East聽Jerusalem, an Israeli official said on Friday, defying a UN vote that implicitly recognized Palestinian statehood there.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Prime Minister聽Benjamin Netanyahu's conservative government had authorized the construction of 3,000 housing units and ordered "preliminary zoning and planning work for thousands" more.
The official would not elaborate. But Israeli media said the government sought to hammer home its rejection of Thursday's upgrade, by the UN General Assembly, of the Palestinians to "non-member observer state" from "entity."
Israel聽and the聽United States聽had opposed the resolution, which shored up the Palestinians' claim on all of the聽West Bank, East聽Jerusalem, and聽Gaza Strip, saying territorial sovereignty should be addressed in direct peace talks with the Jewish state.
Those negotiations have been stalled for two years, however, given Palestinian anger at continued Israeli settlement. The Israelis insist they would keep聽West Bank settlement blocs under any final accord as well as all of聽Jerusalem聽as their capital.
That status for the holy city has never been accepted abroad, where most powers consider the聽settlements聽illegal for taking in land captured in the 1967聽Middle East war.
The 193-nation UN General Assembly overwhelmingly approved the de facto recognition of the sovereign state of Palestine after Palestinian President聽Mahmoud Abbas聽urged the world body to issue what he said was its long overdue "birth certificate."
(Writing by Dan Williams; Editing by Mark Heinrich)