UN member countries unanimously agree on Egyptian resolution, US vetoes

14 countries have voted on Monday in favour of the Egyptian draft resolution on Jerusalem, but the US vetoed it in one of unscrupulous practices exposing the American bias towards Israel.

Egyptian envoy to the UN Amr Aboul atta said, during the voting session, that Cairo rejects any formula to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

“Any attempt to change the situation on the ground would have no legal validity and constitutes a flagrant violation under international law” the Egyptian ambassador said.

He added that such these steps Egypt considers as unilateral and unfair.

Egypt’s draft resolution stipulates that any alteration in the status of Jerusalem without reaching a permanent agreement on Israeli-Palestinian conflict is null and void.

According to Aboul atta, Cairo relied on the international law to reverse the American recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

The Egyptian proposal called upon all countries to refrain from establishing diplomatic missions in Jerusalem.

“The United States has an undiminished commitment to helping bring about final status negotiations that will lead to lasting peace,” US Ambassador Nikki Haley told the council before the vote.

Haley, who has been a supporter of Israel since she took the UN envoy post, said, “For decades, Israel has withstand wave after wave of bias in the UN”.

Both France’s Ambassador Francois Delattre and UK Ambassador Matthew Rycroft spoke to reporters prior to the Council meeting, saying that their countries would vote for the resolution stressing that the status of Jerusalem must be settled during negotiations.

Israel considers Jerusalem its eternal and indivisible capital and wants all embassies based there. Palestinians want the capital of an independent Palestinian state to be eastern Jerusalem, which Israel captured in a 1967 war and annexed in a move never recognized internationally.