Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed Wednesday to make no concessions to the Palestinians after the scathing attack by a White House official of his refusal to reach a compromise for peace.
"I won't make concessions that will endanger our country," Netanyahu told parliament on Wednesday.
The US and the international community have slammed Israel for recent plans to build thousands of new settler homes on Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank and annexed east Jerusalem – moves that are seen as making peace and the creation of a Palestinian state almost impossible.
"Our ultimate interests, first and foremost security and the unity of Jerusalem, are not the top priority for those anonymous sources who attack us and me personally.
"The attack on me came only because I protect the State of Israel," he said.
The response came only hours after a report by The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg quoted an unnamed senior US official who described the Israeli premier as "a chickenshit."
"The thing about Bibi [Netanyahu] is he's a chickenshit," the official was quoted by Goldberg as saying.
"The good thing about Netanyahu is that he's scared to launch wars," the official said. "The bad thing about him is that he won't do anything to reach an accommodation with the Palestinians or with the Sunni Arab states."
He was quoted as adding: "The only thing he's interested in is protecting himself from political defeat. He's not [Yitzhak] Rabin, he's not [Ariel] Sharon, he's certainly no [Menachem] Begin. He's got no guts."
Meanwhile, Israeli Economy Minister Naftali Bennett, in a statement cited by Israeli daily The Jerusalem Post, called on the US administration to "immediately reject these gross comments," asserting that insulting Netanyahu was "an insult not just to him, but to the millions of Israeli citizens and Jews across the globe."
"If what appears in the press is true, then it seems that the current US administration is throwing Israel under the bus," he added.
UN Security Council to discuss Wednesday Israeli settlement plans
The UN Security Council will hold an emergency meeting Wednesday to discuss Israeli plans to build more Zionist settlements in occupied East Jerusalem, diplomats said.
The urgent talks were requested by Jordan following a letter from Palestinian envoy Riyad Mansour, who called on the 15-member council to "address this crisis situation in occupied East Jerusalem."
Israel pledged to build more than 1,000 new settler homes in occupied East Jerusalem on Monday, angering Palestinians who warned it could trigger an "explosion" of violence.
In his letter, the Palestinian representative said the council should demand that Israel rescind its plan immediately and "commit to the path of peace that it has clearly and recklessly abandoned."
The meeting, which began at 7:00 pm GMT, was not expected to yield a resolution and it was unclear if the council would issue a statement following its discussions.
US State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki declined to say whether Washington would oppose any Security Council action that was critical of Israel.
"We don't have information yet on what the plan is," she said.
The European Union said the plans "call once again into serious question Israel's commitment to a negotiated solution with the Palestinians," warning of consequences for EU-Israel ties.
Besides the 1,000 new settler homes, Israel has recently approved the construction of more than 2,600 settler homes in East Jerusalem.
More than 500,000 Israeli settlers live in settlements across the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, in contravention of international law.
International law considers the West Bank and East Jerusalem occupied territories captured by Israel in 1967, deeming all Zionist settlement building on the land illegal.
Palestinian negotiators insist that Israeli settlement building must stop before stalled peace talks with Israel can resume.
Two-state solution in peril
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon last week urged Israel and the Palestinians to move away from unilateral actions that stoke tensions and work toward restarting peace talks.
"International law is clear: settlement activity is illegal. It runs totally counter to the pursuit of a two-state solution," Ban said.
UN diplomats say the Israeli push to build more settlements is imperiling the two-state solution and dimming prospects for Palestinian statehood on land that is riddled with Zionist settlements.
The council meeting on the Israeli actions comes as the Palestinians are pushing for a UN resolution setting 2016 as the date for the end of Israeli occupation.
Numerous pro-Palestine activists argue in favor of a one-state solution, arguing that the creation of a Palestinian state beside Israel would not be sustainable. They add that the two-state solution, which is the only option considered by international actors, will neither solve existing discrimination nor erase economic and military tensions.
Tensions between Israel and the Palestinians have also risen over Jewish visits to the al-Aqsa mosque compound, Islam's third holiest shrine.
Palestinians accuse Israel of waging an aggressive campaign to "Judaize" the city with the aim of erasing its Palestinian and Islamic identity and ultimately driving out its Palestinian inhabitants.
(AFP, Anadolu, Al-Akhbar)
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