Britain, France Urge U.N. Action on Middle East

Britain and France urged the United Nations Security Council on Tuesday to set a framework to broker peace between Israel and the Palestinians as council member New Zealand said it had started working on a draft resolution to kick-start the process.

France said last month that it planned to begin talks on a draft text to lay out “parameters” for ending the Middle East conflict and that it hoped to win over the United States, which has traditionally shielded its ally Israel from such initiatives.

The United States has said it would “reassess” its options on U.S.-Israel relations and Middle East diplomacy after Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu took a stand against Palestinian statehood during his election campaign. Although Netanyahu has since retreated, Washington has insisted that his statements cannot be overlooked.

“It’s the responsibility of this council to adopt a consensual and balanced resolution that sets the parameters of a final status and a timeline for the negotiations,” French U.N. Ambassador Francois Delattre told a council meeting.

France and New Zealand signaled that now was the time for the Security Council to act after Israel held its election last month and before the U.S. presidential campaign ramps up ahead of a November 2016 poll.

“We have been working on a text that might serve the purpose of getting negotiations started,” said New Zealand’s U.N. Ambassador Jim McLay. He added that New Zealand was prepared to see how the French-led push for a resolution played out first.

“We have not seen the latest French text, but if it has a chance of succeeding, New Zealand stands ready to engage and to be helpful,” McLay said.

Britain’s U.N. Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant said that Britain saw merit in a council resolution “setting out the parameters for a peaceful and negotiated solution.”

This article appeared in print on page 6 of the April 23rd, 2015 edition of Hamodia.