Confusion Surrounds Palestinian Bid to Condemn Trump Peace Plan at UN

The Palestinian Authority’s bid to have the United Nations Security Council denounce US President Donald Trump’s Middle East peace plan appears to have hit a snag. According to reports citing anonymous diplomats, a resolution to this effect will not be voted on as initially planned following PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s address to the council on Tuesday, as Ramallah apparently lacks the minimum support of nine countries for the motion to be adopted in the absence of a veto by one of the body’s five permanent members. The US has reportedly been applying “very strong pressure” on nations currently sitting on the 15-member council in order to torpedo the Palestinian move without having to wield its veto power, going so far as to threaten potential backers with economic sanctions. However, late Monday night, senior Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat tweeted that reports of the resolution being withdrawn were “unfounded” and that “consultations” were still underway. The text of the initial resolution, which has since been extensively modified, argued that the Trump Administration’s proposal “breaches international law and the internationally endorsed terms of reference for the achievement of a just, comprehensive and lasting solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict … and undermines the inalienable rights and national aspirations of the Palestinian people.” Abbas has vowed to relegate the US peace plan, which envisions Israel’s annexation of large swaths of the West Bank, to the “dustbins of history.”