Israel Dismayed with U.S. Stand on U.N. Resolution on Immigrants

Israel is still smarting over the U.S. abstention on a resolution adopted last week by the U.N. Human Rights Commission that exhorts Israel not to settle immigrants in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Israeli officials here told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency they were “disappointed” in the Feb. 16 vote and claimed the resolution could harm the Middle East peace process.

Morris Abram, the U.S. envoy to the Human Rights Commission, made clear at the time that the United States concurred in the resolution.

The United States abstained, however, because it believes the issues raised can only be resolved in peace negotiations, Abram explained.

“Our reservation is not new and does not represent any erosion in our position,” he said.

The draft resolution, introduced by the European Community, Japan, Sweden and Morocco, was adopted by a vote of 42-0 at the closing session of the Human Rights Commission’s annual meeting here.

The commission also adopted a two-part resolution condemning Israeli policies and practices in the administered territories. The United States cast the sole negative vote.

The resolution on resettlement says the commission is “seriously concerned at the recent suggestion that immigrants to Israel might be settled in the occupied territories.”

The reference is clearly to remarks by Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir last month that were widely interpreted to mean that Jewish immigrants from the Soviet Union would be settled in the West Bank.

SETTLEMENTS ARE ‘OBSTACLE TO PEACE’

Shamir has denied that was his intent. The Israeli government position is that, while immigrants are free to live wherever they like, there is no policy of settling immigrants in the territories.

The U.N. resolution calls settlement of Israeli civilians in the territories “illegal.” It cites the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949, which expressly forbids an occupying power to transfer populations into or out of captured territory.

It also affirms that the Geneva Convention relative to the protection of civilian populations in time of war is applicable to all Palestinian and Arab territories occupied by Israel since 1967, including Jerusalem.

In his explanation of the American abstention, Abram said, “We concur that the Fourth Geneva Convention is applicable to the occupied territories.

“As to settlements, the (American) administration’s views are well known. We believe the settlements are an obstacle to peace and that putting more settlers in these areas, particularly at this time, works against the cause of peace.”

Abram continued, “We renew today our call on the government of Israel to refrain from establishing new settlements or settling new immigrants in the occupied territories.”

At the United Nations headquarters in New York, meanwhile, the Security Council has still not convened a session requested by the Soviet Union on Feb. 19 regarding the settlement of immigrants in the administered territories.