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Security Council To Convene Despite U.S., Israeli Opposition
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, Aug 16 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Despite opposition from the United States and Israel towards a meeting of the United Nations Security Council to discuss the conflict in the Middle East, the body is expected to meet Friday - or possibly Monday - for this purpose, the Israeli daily
Ha'aretz reported Thursday.
On the agenda will be the situation in the Palestinian Occupied Territories, including Jerusalem, as well as the renewed Palestinian request to deploy international observers to the West Bank and Gaza Strip,
Ha'aretz added.
Israel's ambassador to the U.N., Yehuda Lankry, said Thursday he expected the U.S. to remain firm in its opposition to an observer force to the region, the paper reported.
The U.S. has twice blocked a Palestinian initiative at the U.N. to have monitors stationed in the West Bank and Gaza Strip; and used its veto power at the March 27th meeting, for the first time in four years, to defeat the proposal.
The U.S. said Wednesday it remained opposed to any United Nation action on the Middle East, despite a renewed Palestinian request for an emergency meeting of the Security Council.
State Department spokesman Philip Reeker said the United States remained committed to ending the current escalating cycle of violence between Israel and the Palestinians but that U.N. intervention would not help, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
"We feel that action in the United Nations Security Council will not contribute to these objectives, but we'll assist the parties ... on the goal of moving to full implementation of Mitchell and moving to that goal as quickly as possible," Reeker told reporters.
He referred to recommendations contained in the report of an international commission headed by former U.S. Senator George Mitchell, which outlines a roadmap by which the two sides can resume stalled peace negotiations.
"But that's got to be the process, not a third-party process, not actions in the Security Council."
He spoke as U.N. ambassadors representing Muslim countries met to discuss the Palestinian request for the emergency Council meeting.
Muslim nations also called for an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council to help bring an end to the Israeli takeover of key Palestinian institutions, and to deploy international observers to calm the escalating Israeli-Palestinian violence.
The Security Council is expected to discuss the request from the 50-member Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) Thursday, and schedule an open meeting on Friday or Monday so countries can express their views on the 10-month-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
"We decided to request an emergency session of the Security Council to consider the grave deterioration of the situation in the Middle East, particularly in Palestine, as soon as possible," said Mali's Charge d'Affaires, Issouf Maiga, who chaired Wednesday's OIC meeting.
The OIC believes there is wide international support for reversing the seizure of Orient House, which serves as the unofficial Palestinian headquarters in traditionally Arab East Jerusalem; and for the deployment of international observers, he said.
On Tuesday, the Palestinian observer to the U.N., Nasser Al-Kidwa, said in a letter to U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan that the Council "has the obligation to effectively and immediately intervene to put an end to the present tragic situation in the occupied Palestinian territory, including Jerusalem."
In the letter sent also to the Council president, Alfonso Valdivieso of Colombia, Al-Kidwa called on the Council "to meet and to take the necessary action in this regard in a speedy and prompt manner."
He noted that he had written 61 similar letters since September 29, 2000, shortly after violence erupted between Israelis and Palestinians.
However, the Council has only met on a handful of occasions since then to discuss the crisis.
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