US President-elect Donald Trump today called for vetoing of a UN Security Council resolution on Israel, calling for immediate halt of its settlement activities in the Palestinian territories and east Jerusalem.
"The resolution being considered at the United Nations Security Council regarding Israel should be vetoed," Trump said in a statement, ahead of the Egypt-drafted resolution coming up for voting before the 15-membered body of the United Nations.
The resolution demands Israel immediately halt its settlement activities in the Palestinian territories and east Jerusalem.
A similar resolution was vetoed by the US in 2011.
"As the United States has long maintained, peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians will only come through direct negotiations between the parties, and not through the imposition of terms by the United Nations," Trump said.
"This puts Israel in a very poor negotiating position and is extremely unfair to all Israelis," said the President- elect, who has earlier pledged to recognise Jerusalem as Israel's capital.
Earlier, the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had urged US to veto the resolution.
"The US should veto the anti-Israel resolution at the UN Security Council on Thursday," he tweeted.
The Israeli Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon alleged that the proposed resolution is the "peak of hypocrisy".
It will do nothing to promote a diplomatic process, and will only reward the Palestinian policy of incitement and terror, he said.
"It is absurd that at a time when thousands are being massacred in Syria, the Security Council is devoting time and energy to convene and discuss condemning the only true democracy in the Middle East.
"Over the past months, we have waged a diplomatic effort urging the Council members to reject such a resolution," Danon said.
"We expect our greatest ally not to allow this one-sided and anti-Israel resolution to be adopted by the Council," he said.
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