Palestinian Authority (PA) chief negotiator Saeb Erekat on Thursday said his organization will push its unilateral UN effort to have Israel withdraw from Judea and Samaria by 2016 in November, after US warnings postponed such a push from October.
“If he (Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu) believes that he can sustain the status quo and (that) we’ll do that for him, forget him. This will not last beyond November… we will not take it any more, business as usual no more,” Erekat told AFP in Ramallah.
Erekat’s flouting of US warnings not to take unilateral action comes despite the PA’s dependence on American funding to prop up its economy that is bogged in massive debt.
Recalling a meeting with US Secretary of State John Kerry in Cairo this month, Erekat said “I don’t know if he (Kerry) used the term veto, (but) he said the Security Council is not an option. He was very clear with me.”
The plan would consist of asking the UN Security Council to declare “Palestine” a state and push Israel to abandon its Biblical heartland of Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem, with an American veto able to stop the move that requires the support of all 15 member states.
International antagonism to Israel has been building around the move, with the UK this month passing a non-binding resolution to recognize “Palestine,” after Sweden made a similar statement days earlier.
Another threat the PA has been holding in front of Israel is to join the International Criminal Court (ICC) and sue Israel for “war crimes.”
“The state of Palestine has the full intention…(to) become a member of the ICC,” Erekat said.
It has been assessed that such a move could be like shooting itself in the foot for the PA, as being an ICC member would open the possibility of the PA being sued for its rampant support of terror and human rights abuses.