PA to call for Arab League meeting to discuss US position on settlements

Secretary of PLO’s Executive Committee Saeb Erekat said yesterday that the Palestinian Authority (PA) is to ask the Arab League’s foreign ministers to meet in order to discuss Israeli settlement and the new US position on them.

In a press conference held in Ramallah, Erekat said that the PA President Mahmoud Abbas had been carrying out contacts with many countries and international bodies to encounter this position.

He also said that the PA Representative to the UN Riyad Mansour had started discussions with UN Security Council members in relation to the US decision.

“We will knock on the door of every international body, starting from the ICC, ICJ and UN Human Rights Council,” he added.

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“The new US position poses a danger to international peace and security,” he said, adding: “The US has opened the door for violence, extremism, chaos and bloodshed through its decision that settlement is not illegal.”

Erekat also said that the decision is “void” and “will not change anything on the ground due to its contradiction to the international law.”

On Monday, the US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that the US is no longer considering Israeli Jewish settlement activity in the occupied West Bank as illegal.

US decision to back Israel’s building of settlements – Cartoon [Sabaaneh/MiddleEastMonitor]