<\/p>\n
The following is a near-verbatim transcript of today\u2019s noon briefing by St\u00e9phane Dujarric, Spokesman for the Secretary-General.<\/p>\n
\/\u2026<\/p>\n
Middle East<\/u><\/span><\/p>\n I\u2019ve been asked by some of your colleagues before the briefing about the announcement made by the security cabinet in Israel regarding settlements, and I can tell you that the Secretary-General is deeply concerned by yesterday\u2019s announcement by the Israeli Security Cabinet that it has decided to authorize nine settlement outposts in the occupied West Bank.\u00a0\u00a0If these measures are implemented, they would further undermine prospects for a viable two-State solution.\u00a0\u00a0He reiterates that all settlements are illegal under international law and a substantial obstacle to peace.\u00a0\u00a0He calls for unilateral actions that erode the prospects for a political solution on the basis of United Nations resolutions, international law and bilateral agreements to stop.<\/span><\/p>\n \/…<\/p>\n Questions and Answers<\/u><\/p>\n \/…<\/p>\n Question<\/span><\/u>:\u00a0\u00a0Thank you, St\u00e9phane.\u00a0\u00a0In February, Mr.\u00a0[Tor] Wennesland issued a statement condemning killing of a six-year-old Israeli boy.\u00a0\u00a0Today, a sniper, an Israeli sniper killed a young Palestinian in Jenin.\u00a0\u00a0His name is Qusai Radwan Yousef Waked.\u00a0\u00a0I sent you, I sent Farhan Haq the statement about his killing from children\u2026 for protection of children, organization for protection of children.\u00a0\u00a0Would he issue similar statement, using the word \u201ccondemn\u201d, killing of young Palestinian by a sniper at the distance of 550 meters?<\/span><\/p>\n Spokesman<\/span><\/u>:\u00a0\u00a0Too many times, and we\u2019re seeing it more and more, is a growing number of civilians, including women and children, who have been killed in this spiral of violence.\u00a0\u00a0Mr.\u00a0Wennesland, I think, has been very clear, and we continue to be not only deeply disturbed but saddened by all of this.\u00a0\u00a0What is important is that all concerned parties take immediate steps to reduce tensions and break this deadly cycle.<\/span><\/p>\n Iftikhar?<\/span><\/p>\n Question<\/span><\/u>:\u00a0\u00a0Thank you Steph, all questions about the big earthquake have been asked so, therefore, I ask you, I mean, I refer you to your statement that you read out about Israeli Security Cabinet\u2019s decision to create more settlements.\u00a0\u00a0Every time Israel makes this, creates more settlements, the same statement is issued that it erodes the prospects of a two-State solution, but does it now pose a threat to international peace and security?<\/span><\/p>\n Spokesman<\/span><\/u>:\u00a0\u00a0You know, the Secretary-General through his various representatives reports regularly back to the Security Council on the issue of Israel and Palestine, which is on the topic of those\u2026 one of the topics that Security Council regularly discusses.\u00a0\u00a0I really don\u2019t have anything to add to what we\u2019ve already said on the issue and have said quite a number of times, I might add.<\/span><\/p>\n \/…<\/p>\n For information media. Not an official record.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The following is a near-verbatim transcript of today\u2019s noon briefing by St\u00e9phane Dujarric, Spokesman for the Secretary-General. \/\u2026 Middle East I\u2019ve been asked by some of your colleagues before the briefing about the announcement made by the security cabinet in Israel regarding settlements, and I can tell you that the Secretary-General is deeply concerned […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":172,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"template":"template-page.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"country":[],"document-category":[2573],"document-source":[5352,6169,1877],"committee-meeting":[],"document-subject":[1829,2033,2137],"entity":[1729],"document-language":[6542],"class_list":["post-285487","document","type-document","status-publish","hentry","document-category-highlights-of-the-noon-briefing","document-source-secretary-general","document-source-united-nations-department-of-global-communications","document-source-united-nations-special-coordinator-for-the-middle-east-peace-process-unsco","document-subject-casualties","document-subject-children","document-subject-settlements","entity-united-nations-system","document-language-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document\/285487","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/document"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/172"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document\/285487\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=285487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"country","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/country?post=285487"},{"taxonomy":"document-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-category?post=285487"},{"taxonomy":"document-source","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-source?post=285487"},{"taxonomy":"committee-meeting","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/committee-meeting?post=285487"},{"taxonomy":"document-subject","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-subject?post=285487"},{"taxonomy":"entity","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/entity?post=285487"},{"taxonomy":"document-language","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-language?post=285487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}