Israel says UN chief inciting ‘terror’ by defending Palestinians

Israel has accused UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon of promoting “terror” after he defended the Palestinian uprising as a natural response to the Tel Aviv regime’s occupation of their lands.

In a letter to Ban on Monday, Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon urged Ban to withdraw the comments he made in last month’s address to the UN Security Council.

Ban had urged Israel to freeze the construction of settler units in the occupied territories, describing settlement expansion “an affront to the Palestinian people and to the international community.”

Commenting on continued Palestinians protests, Ban had also said that “as oppressed peoples have demonstrated throughout the ages, it is human nature to react to occupation.”

In the letter, the Israeli official claimed that the UN chief’s statements can put Israel and the rest of the world in jeopardy.

The statement have created “two categories of terror: terror directed at Israelis and terror directed at the rest of the world,” he wrote.

Danon said the world body must punish the perpetrators of attacks against Israelis instead of criticizing the Tel Aviv regime for the ongoing unrest in the occupied Palestinian lands.

Ban's spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the UN chief will “stand by every word he has used.”

In an opinion piece published last week by The New York Times, Ban wrote, “The time has come for Israelis, Palestinians and the international community to read the writing on the wall: The status quo is untenable."

"Keeping another people under indefinite occupation undermines the security and the future of both Israelis and Palestinians,” he said.

Tensions have been running high in the West Bank after Israel’s imposition in August 2015 of restrictions on the entry of Palestinian worshipers into the al-Aqsa Mosque compound. The mosque in East al-Quds (Jerusalem) is the third holiest site in Islam.

More than 170 Palestinians, including children and women, have been killed by Israeli forces since the outbreak of tensions in the occupied Palestinian territories last October. Some 27 Israelis, mostly soldiers, have also lost their lives in Palestinian attacks.

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