UN Security Council backs draft resolution opposing Israel settlements

The U.N. Security Council unanimously approved a watered-down statement strongly opposing Israel's continued construction and expansion of settlements Monday.

The U.N. Security Council unanimously approved a watered-down statement strongly opposing Israel’s continued construction and expansion of settlements Monday. The vote came after high-stakes negotiations by the Biden administration succeeded in derailing a legally binding resolution that would have demanded a halt to Israeli settlement activity.

The Palestinian-backed draft resolution was the subject of frantic talks by senior Biden administration officials including Secretary of States Antony Blinken with Palestinian, Israeli and United Arab Emirates leaders. Those discussions culminated in a deal Sunday to forego it in favor of a weaker presidential statement that is not legally binding, according to multiple diplomats familiar with the situation.

The deal averted a potential diplomatic crisis, with the U.S. almost certainly vetoing the resolution, which would have angered Palestinian supporters at a time when the U.S. and its Western allies are trying to gain international support against Russia for its war with Ukraine. The war marked its one-year anniversary of President Vladimir Putin’s invasion this week.

To avoid a vote on the draft resolution, the diplomats said the U.S. managed to convince both Israel and the Palestinians to agree in principle to a six-month freeze in any unilateral action they might take.

On the Israeli side, that would mean a commitment to not expanding settlements until at least August, according to the diplomats. On Monday, the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would not greenlight any new wildcat settlements in the West Bank beyond nine outposts that it approved retroactively earlier this month.

On the Palestinian side, the diplomats said it would mean a commitment until August not to pursue action against Israel at the U.N. and other international bodies such as the World Court, the International Criminal Court and the U.N. Human Rights Council.

The Palestinian push for a resolution came as Israel’s new right-wing government has reaffirmed its commitment to construct new settlements in the West Bank and expand its authority on land the Palestinians seek for a future state.

Israel captured the West Bank, along with east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, in the 1967 Mideast war. The United Nations and most of the international community consider Israeli settlements illegal and an obstacle to ending the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Some 700,000 Israeli settlers live in the West Bank and Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem.