Mideast envoy implores U.N. council to act

UNITED NATIONS -- The United Nations' top Mideast envoy challenged the Security Council on Thursday to lead the way to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, suggesting it should present a framework for negotiations that "may be the only way to preserve the goal of a two-state solution."

Robert Serry, in his final briefing to the council, also sharply criticized Israel's illegal building of settlements in Palestinian territories, saying it "may kill the very possibility of reaching peace on the paradigm of two states for two peoples."

"I frankly do not know if it is already too late," Serry said.

The U.N. envoy spoke a day after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was officially chosen to form a new government after an acrimonious election campaign.

President Barack Obama has been clear this week about his impatience with Netanyahu's comments shortly before the Israeli elections that he would not allow the establishment of a Palestinian state on his watch.

Netanyahu has struck a conciliatory tone since the elections. But Obama has said he will reassess U.S. policy toward Israel after Netanyahu's remarks, meaning that the Security Council could be a potential place to take action on the decades-long conflict.

The council has long been blocked from taking action on the crisis, as the United States is a top Israeli ally whose veto power as a permanent council member has been used to protect Israel for years as the U.S. sought a diplomatic solution.

Diplomats on Thursday, however, said the United States expressed no hint of Obama's stance in private consultations after Serry's public briefing. Spokesmen for the U.S. mission had no immediate comment.

French Ambassador Francois Delattre, the current council president, said all council members strongly support a two-state solution that "seems more and more distant each passing day."

But he said a "majority of members" support the council taking a stronger role in getting negotiations to resume.

Serry would not discuss the timing of a possible council resolution, saying only that maybe the time has come if the two sides can't agree on a framework for peace talks themselves.

The Palestinian ambassador to the U.N., Riyad Mansour, said he agrees with Serry's comments to the council on its need to take the lead.

"We hope the Security Council will ... take that responsibility very seriously," Mansour said.

He said he wants to see a resolution with a time frame for ending the Israeli occupation and with terms of reference for the peace process.

Mansour also said Netanyahu does not support a two-state solution, "regardless of his backpedalling" on his comments.

Israeli U.N. Ambassador Ron Prosor criticized the Palestinians for pursuing "empty resolutions" and said his country wants direct negotiations instead of going through the council.

Also Thursday, the human-rights group Amnesty International said in a report that Palestinian militants committed war crimes during a 2014 Gaza conflict by killing both Israeli and Palestinian civilians using indiscriminate projectiles.

The report comes after two other reports issued in late 2014 that accused Israel of war crimes for attacks on multistory civilian buildings and Palestinian homes during the war.

The 50-day Gaza war left more than 2,100 Palestinians dead, mostly civilians, according to Palestinian and U.N. officials. On the Israeli side, 66 soldiers and six civilians were killed.

The Palestinians have pressed for a war-crimes investigation of Israel's actions during the war.

But Palestinian militants, including the armed wing of Hamas, launched unguided rockets and mortar shells from civilian areas toward other civilian areas, a breach of international law, the human-rights group said.

Six civilians in Israel were killed in such attacks, and 13 Palestinian civilians were killed when a Palestinian projectile apparently landed in a Gaza refugee camp.

Palestinians have claimed that the Israeli military was responsible for that attack, but Amnesty International said an independent munitions expert examining the evidence on the group's behalf concluded that a Palestinian rocket was responsible.

The report also alleged other international humanitarian law violations during the conflict, including Palestinian militant groups' storing munitions in civilian buildings and United Nations schools, and launching attacks near locations where hundreds of displaced civilians were taking shelter.

Hamas official Taher al-Nounou denied the allegations in the Amnesty report, saying it relied on the Israeli narrative. He said Hamas did not target civilians.

Information for this article was contributed by staff members of The Associated Press.

A Section on 03/27/2015

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