UN condemns huge Israeli settlement plan

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/01/condemns-huge-israeli-settlement-plan-170125041616025.html 

 

 

The United Nations has denounced recent Israeli initiatives to accelerate settlement construction in occupied Palestinian territory, stressing that "unilateral actions" are an obstacle to peace based on a two-state solution.

"For the secretary-general there is no plan B for the two-states solution," UN chief Antonio Guterres' spokesman Stephane Dujarric said on Tuesday.

"In this respect any unilateral decision that can be an obstacle to the two-state goal is of grave concern for the secretary-general."

Israel approved a plan to build 2,500 new settlement homes in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday, two days after it accepted building permits for more than 500 settler homes in occupied East Jerusalem.

The biggest settlement plan announced since 2013, it comes close after the election of US President Donald Trump, who has not been critical of settlement activity. Settlements are illegal under international law.

Last month, the UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding that Israel halt its settlement expansion in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Dujarric said the UN's position on settlement building in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem had not changed.

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