Europe urges U.S. to reveal its peace proposals for M.E., blasts Trump’s move as “unhelpful”

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Palestinian protesters clash with Israeli troops near an Israeli checkpoint in the West Bank city of Ramallah on December 8, 2017. Abbas Momani / AFP
Palestinian protesters clash with Israeli troops near an Israeli checkpoint in the West Bank city of Ramallah on December 8, 2017. Abbas Momani / AFP

Britain, France, Germany, Sweden and Italy called on the USA on Friday to put forward detailed proposals for peace between Israel and the Palestinians and described as “unhelpful” President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

Trump’s reversal of decades of U.S. policy on Wednesday sparked a Palestinian “day of rage” on Friday. Thousands of Palestinians demonstrated, scores were hurt and at least one was killed in clashes with Israeli troops.

Amid anger in the Arab world and concern among Washington’s Western allies, the United Nations Security Council met on Friday at the request of eight of the 15 members – Britain, France, Sweden, Bolivia, Uruguay, Italy, Senegal and Egypt.

In a joint statement after the meeting, Britain, France, Germany, Sweden and Italy said the U.S. decision, which includes plans to move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv, was “unhelpful in terms of prospects for peace in the region.”

“We stand ready to contribute to all credible efforts to restart the peace process, on the basis of internationally agreed parameters, leading to a two-State solution,” they said. “We encourage the U.S. Administration to now bring forward detailed proposals for an Israel-Palestinian settlement.”

Egypt’s U.N. Ambassador Amr Aboulatta said the U.S. decision would have “a grave, negative impact” on the peace process.

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said that Washington has credibility as a mediator with both Israel and the Palestinians and accused the United Nations of damaging rather than advancing peace prospects with unfair attacks on Israel.

“Israel will never be, and should never be, bullied into an agreement by the United Nations, or by any collection of countries that have proven their disregard for Israel’s security,” Haley said.

Escalation risk

Haley said Trump was committed to the peace process and that the United States had not taken a position on Jerusalem’s borders or boundaries and was not advocating any changes to the arrangements at the holy sites.

“Our actions are intended to help advance the cause of peace,” she said. “We believe we might be closer to that goal than ever before.”

Earlier on Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said during a news conference in Paris that any final decision on the status of Jerusalem would depend on negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians.

United Nations Middle East envoy Nickolay Mladenov warned there was a risk of violent escalation.

“There is a serious risk today that we may see a chain of unilateral actions, which can only push us further away from achieving our shared goal of peace,” Mladenov told the U.N. Security Council.

Israel considers all of Jerusalem to be its capital. Palestinians want the eastern part of the city as the capital of a future independent state of their own.

Most countries consider East Jerusalem, which Israel annexed after capturing it in the 1967 Middle East War, to be occupied territory, including the Old City, home to sites considered holy to Muslims, Jews and Christians alike.

Map showing key holy sites in Jerusalem's Old City

A U.N. Security Council resolution adopted in December last year “underlines that it will not recognize any changes to the 4 June 1967 lines, including with regard to Jerusalem, other than those agreed by the parties through negotiations.”

That resolution was approved with 14 votes in favor and an abstention by former U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration, which defied heavy pressure from long-time ally Israel and Trump, who was then president-elect, for Washington to wield its veto.

(REUTERS)

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5 responses to “Europe urges U.S. to reveal its peace proposals for M.E., blasts Trump’s move as “unhelpful””

  1. Eurape not played enough in fascism

  2. Hind Abyad Avatar

    Like ISIS and Zionism, evangelical Christians are supporting Israel because of a messianic apocalyptic agenda.

    “Christianity and Jerusalem Donald Trump’s Jerusalem move sparks Christian disputes.”
    Evangelicals and Catholics react in different ways to the president’s proclamation”
    https://www.economist.com/blogs/erasmus/2017/12/christianity-and-jerusalem

    1. “Zionism” supports “Israel” because of an “apocalyptic agenda”? Another day, another pearl of wisdom from the nuthouse.

  3. Hind Abyad Avatar

    ‘Israel has a troubling culture of high-level corruption’
    Mar 22, 2017.
    “Incredibly, every Israeli prime minister since Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres, who
    served in the mid-1990s, has at one time or another faced criminal investigations while in office.

    Take Ariel Sharon, the bellicose former general who ran Israel from March 2001 to April 2006. At the height of his powers, he avoided criminal charges in the “Greek Island” affair, where he was accused of taking bribes in exchange for helping an Israeli tycoon build a casino on a small and remote island in the Aegean Sea. Selling arms to Iran affair. The Sabra Shatila affair.

    Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, already weakened by Israel’s failed military campaign in South Lebanon in 2006, was convicted in a 2009 bribery case. Olmert is currently serving his 18-month sentence in the same prison where former Israeli President Moshe Katsav spent five years following a rape conviction.

    Netanyahu himself faced several criminal investigations during his first term in office, which ran from 1996 to 1999. He was defeated by Ehud Barak in May 1999, 16 months before the attorney general decided to drop the last of those investigations.
    Barak, in turn, faced a criminal probe of his own for alleged campaign financing violations. Those charges were dropped in 2003.

    “It’s a list of suspects and convicted felons that shed a very bad light on our political system,” says Tamar Zandberg, a lawmaker from the left-wing Meretz Party. “Many of us believed that Olmert’s conviction was a watershed moment, and that people would get the message. This turned out to be wishful thinking.”

  4. Hind Abyad Avatar

    ‘Evangelicalism’s useful idiots’

    With news that the Presbyterian Church (USA) has narrowly voted to divest from three companies doing business with Israel, pro Israel activists watch with dismay as another victory goes into the win column for proponents of the Palestinian narrative.”
    http://www.jpost.com/Blogs/Christian-World/Evangelicalisms-useful-idiots-363708

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