"There is no Plan B to a two-state solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian
conflict, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Tuesday during his
first visit to the region since taking office in January.
His comments followed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s
statement Monday that Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian
territories "will not be uprooted.”
Speaking in Barkan, a settlement in the northern West Bank, Netanyahu
added: "We have returned here for good. There will be no more uprooting
of settlements in the Land of Israel.”
Nabil Shaath, a senior advisor to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas,
told Arab News that Guterres "was very upset” when he read Netanyahu’s
comments.
"Netanyahu is very much in sync with the right-wing Zionist ideology
that doesn’t want peace or a peace process, but wants to continue
illegal Jewish settlements,” Shaath said.
Standing next to Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah in Ramallah
Tuesday, Guterres said: "I want to express very strongly the total
commitment of the United Nations, and my personal total commitment, to
do everything for a two-state solution to materialize. I have said
several times there is no Plan B to a two-state solution.”
Riyad Mansour, Palestine’s permanent observer to the UN, told Arab News:
"If there’s no Plan B, then the suspension of settlement activities
throughout the occupied territories, including East Jerusalem, is
essential.”
Ghassan Daghlas, a Palestinian official who monitors settlement activity
in the northern West Bank, told Arab News: "Netanyahu wants to defy the
world by making the illegal legal. He wants everyone to accept what is
clearly wrong and against the law.”
He added: "It’s absurd that these statements are being made during the UN secretary-general’s visit.”
A two-state solution has been the basis of international diplomacy since
at least the early 1990s, but the Trump administration has yet to
publicly endorse it.
The Palestinians seek the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the
Gaza Strip for an independent state alongside Israel, which captured the
territories in 1967 but withdrew from Gaza in 2005.