France signaled on Friday that it would press the Security Council to adopt a resolution soon to spur talks between Israel and the Palestinians, a step that the United States resisted last year, reports The New York Times.
“If we want to have a two-state solution and if we want to avoid a complete crash, we must go in the same direction,” the French foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, told reporters at the United Nations on Friday morning. “I hope the partners who were reluctant will not be reluctant.”
Mr. Fabius declined to say how soon France would bring up a draft measure before the Council. But he said France would consult with other Council members “in the coming days” over a framework for negotiations. Doing so is likely to put pressure on the White House to act.
An American official, who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the discussions, said by email on Friday: “We’re not going to get ahead of any decisions about what the United States would do with regard to potential action at the U.N. Security Council. We continue to engage with key stakeholders, including the French, to find a way forward that advances the interest we and others share in a two-state solution.”
France circulated a draft late in 2014 that would have laid out what are known as parameters for talks between the two sides in the Middle East conflict, and would have set a deadline for completing the talks. The Obama administration was reluctant to support that draft, especially with a general election in Israel approaching.
Since then, the White House has signaled publicly that it could re-evaluate its position, especially in light of prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s election victory, won partly on the strength of hard-line rhetoric.
Even so, the administration has said it will not make a decision until after Mr. Netanyahu forms his new coalition government, a stance that suggested that Washington was in no mood to rush into a Security Council measure that it could not control.