Palestine UNSC draft to seek Israel occupation end

The Palestinian government is set to hand over a draft resolution to the United Nations Security Council to put pressure on the Israeli regime to end its occupation, an official says.

Senior Palestine Liberation Organization member Wassel Abu Yussef said on Sunday that the Palestinian leadership has decided “to go to the Security Council next Wednesday to vote on their project to end the occupation” of West Bank and East al-Quds (Jerusalem).

The draft resolution, approved by the Arab League in September, sets 2016 as the date for a full Israeli withdrawal from the Palestinian territories.

The text is also expected to lay out a timeframe for negotiations on a final peace deal between Israelis and Palestinians.

The text is widely expected to be vetoed by the United States, a close ally of the Zionist regime, because it set a two-year timetable for the withdrawal of the Israeli army from the occupied West Bank.

Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected setting any deadline for the pullout of Israeli troops from the occupied territories.

In the past few months, the Palestinian national unity government has been pushing for a UN resolution that determines the borders of the future Palestinian state based on the pre-1967 lines. Israel has expressed outcries over the motion.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas says there will be no negotiations over land with Israel as Palestinians will not give up even an inch of their land.

In 1967, Israel occupied the West Bank, East al-Quds (Jerusalem), and the Gaza Strip but withdrew from the enclave in 2005.

Palestinians are seeking to create an independent state on the territories of the West Bank, East al-Quds and the Gaza Strip.

Tel Aviv, however, has refused to return to the 1967 borders and is unwilling to discuss the issue of East al-Quds.