UN’s Jerusalem vote riles Trump

US TO CUT OFF AID TO THOSE VOTING AGAINST As Israeli PM dubs UN a ‘house of lies’ and says the city is Israel’s capital regardless.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dubbed the United Nations (UN) a “house of lies” yesterday, ahead of a General Assembly vote on a resolution rejecting US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

“The State of Israel rejects outright this vote, even before it passes,” he said in Israel. “The attitude to Israel of many nations in the world, in all the continents, is changing outside of the UN walls, and will eventually filter into the UN as well – the house of lies,” he said.

The UN General Assembly was to hold an emergency session later yesterday to vote on a draft resolution that the US vetoed at the Security Council on Monday after all other 14 council members voted in favour.

“Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, whether the UN recognises it or not,” Netanyahu said. “It took 70 years until the US officially recognised it and it will take many more years until the UN recognises it too.”

Trump’s December 6 decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and move the US embassy from Tel Aviv broke with international consensus, triggering protests across the Muslim world and drawing widespread condemnation.

Trump on Wednesday threatened to cut off aid to countries that vote in favour of a draft UN resolution calling for the US to withdraw its decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. “They take hundreds of millions of dollars and even billions of dollars, and then they vote against us. Well, we’re watching those votes. Let them vote against us. We’ll save a lot. We don’t care,” Trump told reporters at the White House.

US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley echoed that in a Twitter post, saying: “The US will be taking names.”–