Despite widespread condemnation from across the Israeli political spectrum of the anti-settlements resolution passed Friday by the United Nations Security Council, one former Labor Party MK has called it an "unintended victory for Israel," The Times of Israel reported.
Einat Wilf, who served as a Knesset member between 2010 and 2013, argued that the resolution will actually make it easier for President-elect Donald Trump to keep a campaign promise and move the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
Wilf's reasoning is that the U.N. resolution "provides the most resounding international and legal support yet for Israel within the 1949 ceasefire lines, including west Jerusalem."
The international community currently does not recognize Israeli sovereignty over any part of Jerusalem, even the western half that has been under Israel's control since the first Arab-Israeli war in 1948-49, and there are currently no foreign embassies there.
Israel captured the eastern part of Jerusalem, including the Old City, in the 1967 Six Day War, creating a "united Jerusalem" that the nations of the world do not recognize.
The essence of Wilf's argument is that since the U.N. decision states that territory Israel captured in 1967 "has no legal validity" and that all nations should "distinguish, in their relevant dealings, between the territory of the State of Israel and the territories occupied since 1967," this means that the Security Council "is essentially clarifying the absolute legality of the territory of Israel within the 1949 ceasefire lines, including west Jerusalem."
Ironically, those two points of the U.N. decision for most Israeli politicians are the most troubling, since they appear to lay the groundwork for boycotts of Israeli goods and citizens who are over the pre-1967 lines.
Trump has promised to implement a 1995 American law that stipulates the U.S.will move its embassy to Jerusalem. Despite this law, every U.S. president has refused to do so, citing a clause in the law that states the president can delay the move if it would endanger American security.
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