UN resolution on Israel and the settlements postponed after Trump intervention

A draft submitted by Egypt, was withdrawn the next day. US President-elect, not yet in office, imposed US veto.

New York (AsiaNews / Agencies) - The UN Security Council has delayed a vote on a resolution calling on Israel to stop the expansion of its colonies in the Occupied Territories. The motion was filed a day earlier by Egypt, but the same country withdrew it to present it later after the United States intervened saying they would place their veto.

According to the BBC, the United States had only intended to abstain, thus allowing the motion to pass. But an Israeli representative contacted the new president-elect Donald Trump asking for his intervention. Trump thus asked the Security Council to abandon the motion.

In a video posted on his Twitter account, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that " Israelis deeply appreciate one of the great pillars of the US-Israel alliance: the willingness over many years of the United States to stand up in the UN and veto anti-Israel resolutions".

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi had a telephone conversation with Trump and decided to withdraw the motion, to allow time for the new US administration, which will begin on January 20, to pursue the matter.

The draft resolution demands that "Israel immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem." It states that Israeli settlements have "no legal validity" and are "dangerously imperiling the viability of the two-state solution" that would see an independent Palestine co-exist alongside Israel.

Under the Netanyahu government there has been an impressive increase in Israeli settlements. In 2015 at least 15 thousand new settlers have moved into the West Bank.

According to the organization Peace Now in 2016 the Israeli administration has given the green light for 2,623 new settlements. These include 756 illegal houses and those later "legalized". To date at least 570 thousand Israelis live in over 130 settlements built by Israel since 1967, when the occupation began and have grown exponentially in recent times thanks to the expansionist policy of the Israeli government.

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