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US Envoy Says Full UN Membership Won’t Help Palestinians with Statehood 

A man looks at a plume of smoke after Israeli bombardment at Al-Daraj neighborhood in Gaza City on April 16, 2024, amid ongoing battles between Israel and Hamas. (AFP)
A man looks at a plume of smoke after Israeli bombardment at Al-Daraj neighborhood in Gaza City on April 16, 2024, amid ongoing battles between Israel and Hamas. (AFP)
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US Envoy Says Full UN Membership Won’t Help Palestinians with Statehood 

A man looks at a plume of smoke after Israeli bombardment at Al-Daraj neighborhood in Gaza City on April 16, 2024, amid ongoing battles between Israel and Hamas. (AFP)
A man looks at a plume of smoke after Israeli bombardment at Al-Daraj neighborhood in Gaza City on April 16, 2024, amid ongoing battles between Israel and Hamas. (AFP)

US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield said on Wednesday she did not see a UN resolution recommending the Palestinian Authority become a full UN member helping lead to a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Thomas-Greenfield made the comments at a news conference in Seoul, after being asked whether the United States was open to recognize the request by the Palestinian Authority to have full UN membership.

"We do not see that doing a resolution in the Security Council will necessarily get us to a place where we can find... a two-state solution moving forward," said Thomas-Greenfield.

She said US President Joe Biden had categorically said that Washington supported a two-state solution and was working on the ground to get that in place as soon as possible.

The Palestinian Authority is expected to push the 15-member Security Council to vote, as early as Thursday, on a draft resolution recommending it become a full member of the world body, diplomats said. Security Council member Algeria circulated a draft text late on Tuesday.

A UN Security Council committee considering the application "was unable to make a unanimous recommendation" on whether it met the criteria, according to the committee report seen by Reuters on Tuesday.

An application to become a full UN member needs to be approved by the Security Council - where the United States can cast a veto - and then at least two-thirds of the 193-member General Assembly.

Little progress has been made on achieving Palestinian statehood since the signing of the Oslo Accords between Israel and the Palestinian Authority in the early 1990s.

Among the obstacles are expanding Israeli settlements, and Israel's UN Ambassador Gilad Erdan has said that the Palestinian Authority had not met the required criteria for statehood.

The Palestinian Authority, headed by President Mahmoud Abbas, exercises limited self-rule in the West Bank and is Israel's partner to the Oslo Accords. Hamas in 2007 ousted the Palestinian Authority from power in the Gaza Strip.

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Israeli Troops, Palestinian Fighters Clash in West Bank after Incidents Near Settlements

Israeli troops move inside the Jenin refugee camp on the fourth day of an Israeli military operation in the West Bank city of Jenin, 31 August 2024. EPA/ALAA BADARNEH
Israeli troops move inside the Jenin refugee camp on the fourth day of an Israeli military operation in the West Bank city of Jenin, 31 August 2024. EPA/ALAA BADARNEH
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Israeli Troops, Palestinian Fighters Clash in West Bank after Incidents Near Settlements

Israeli troops move inside the Jenin refugee camp on the fourth day of an Israeli military operation in the West Bank city of Jenin, 31 August 2024. EPA/ALAA BADARNEH
Israeli troops move inside the Jenin refugee camp on the fourth day of an Israeli military operation in the West Bank city of Jenin, 31 August 2024. EPA/ALAA BADARNEH

Clashes broke out between Israeli troops and Palestinian fighters in the occupied West Bank on Saturday as Israel pushed ahead with a military operation in the flashpoint city of Jenin.
Israeli troops searched areas around Jewish settlements after two separate security incidents on Friday evening. In Jenin itself, drones and helicopters circled overhead while the sound of sporadic firing could be heard in the city, said Reuters.
Hundreds of Israeli troops have been carrying out raids since Wednesday in one of their largest actions in the West Bank in months.
The operation, which Israel says was mounted to block Iranian-backed militant groups from attacking its citizens, has drawn international calls for a halt.
At least 19 Palestinians, including armed fighters and civilians, have now been killed since it began. The Israeli military said on Saturday a soldier had been killed during the fighting in the West Bank.
The Israeli forces were battling Palestinian fighters from armed factions that have long had a strong presence in Jenin and the adjoining refugee camp, a densely populated township housing families driven from their homes in the 1948 Middle East war around the creation of Israel.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said on Saturday a child had been taken to hospital in Jenin with a bullet wound to the head.
The escalation in hostilities in the West Bank takes place as fighting between Israeli forces and Hamas group still rages in the coastal Gaza Strip nearly 11 months since it began, and hostilities with the Iranian-backed Hezbollah movement in the Israel-Lebanon border area have intensified.
Late on Friday, Israeli forces said two men were killed in separate incidents near Gush Etzion, a large West Bank settlement cluster located south of Jerusalem, that the military assessed were both attempted attacks on Israelis.
In the first, a car exploded at a petrol station in what the army said was an attempted car bombing attack. The military said a man was shot dead after he got out of the car and tried to attack soldiers.
In the second incident, a man was killed after the military said a car attempted to ram a security guard and infiltrate the Karmei Tzur settlement. The car was chased by security forces and crashed and an explosive device in it was detonated, the military said in a statement.
The two deaths were confirmed by Palestinian health authorities but they gave no details on how they died.
Troops combed the area following the two incidents. Security forces also carried out raids in the city of Hebron, where the two men came from.
Hamas praised what it called a "double heroic operation" in the West Bank. It said in a statement it was "a clear message that resistance will remain striking, prolonged and sustained as long as the brutal occupation's aggression and targeting of our people and land continue".
The group, however, did not claim direct responsibility for the attacks.
Israeli army chief General Herzi Halevi said on Saturday Israel would step up defensive measures as well as offensive actions like the Jenin operation.
Amid the gunfire, armored bulldozers searching for roadside bombs have ploughed up large stretches of paved roads and water pipes have been damaged, leading to flooding in some areas.
Since the Hamas attack on Israel last October that triggered the Gaza war, at least 660 Palestinian combatants and civilians have been killed in the West Bank, according to Palestinian tallies, some by Israeli troops and some by Jewish settlers who have carried out frequent attacks on Palestinian communities.
Israel says Iran provides weapons and support to militant factions in the West Bank - under Israeli occupation since the 1967 Middle East war - and the military has as a result cranked up its operations there.