Ambassador Danny Danon, Israel’s permanent representative to the UN, on Saturday night condemned the draft resolution submitted to the UN Security Council calling to rescind President Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.
“As Jews around the world are celebrating Hanukkah, the liberation of Jerusalem two-thousand years ago, the Palestinians continue to try to reinvent history,” he said in a statement emailed Saturday night from New York. “No vote or debate will change the clear reality that Jerusalem has and always will be the capital of Israel. Together with our allies, we will continue to fight, once again, for historical truth.”
The draft resolution was submitted to the UN Security Council by Egypt on behalf of the Palestinian Authority.
The Egyptian-sponsored draft resolution describes as null and void any changes to Jerusalem’s status. The one-page text does not explicitly mentions the American move, but declares that such declarations have no legal validity and “demands that all states comply with Security Council resolutions regarding the Holy City of Jerusalem.”
One such resolution, which was adopted with President Obama’s blessings moments before leaving office, in December 2016, “underlines that [the UNSC] will not recognize any changes to the June 4, 1967 lines, including with regard to Jerusalem, other than those agreed by the parties through negotiations.”
The vote on the Jerusalem declaration, which is bound to be vetoed by the US, is set for early this week – barring unexpected changes.