Netanyahu fumes over UNGA vote for Palestine statehood

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday said the UN General Assembly (UNGA) vote for upgrading Palestine status has no actual significance. Palestinian statehood is totally unlikely without reaching a negotiated peaceful settlement that could ensure Israel's security, according to a press release by Netanyahu's office. The statement comes after the UNGA voted 138-9 in favor of granting a non-member status for Palestine yesterday with 41 abstentions. Commenting on Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' remarks at the UNGA session, Netanyahu said the remarks showed deep hatred for, and prejudice against, Israel. The world has seen Abbas disseminating malice and lies against Israel; this is not the behavior of a man who truly wants peace, the Israeli leader stressed. Meanwhile, the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), ruling in Gaza Strip, welcomed the UNGA vote as "another diplomatic gain for the Palestinian people." "Though Palestine deserves more than a non-member status at the UN, we welcome this achievement," said Ezzat Al-Rashq, member of Hamas politburo, in statements to the press here. "We reaffirm the need to put this step in its normal discourse as part of a national strategic vision for defending our legitimate right to restore sovereignty over all occupied land from the river (of Jordan) to the sea (the Mediterranean)," Al-Rashq stressed. "We bet that our valiant people and resistance will be able to liberate our land and establish the independent state of Palestine with Jerusalem as its capital," he went on. On a similar note, the Fatah movement, ruling in the West Bank, hailed the move as "a historic victory for the Palestinian people and their wise leaders. " Appreciating the 138 UN member states which voted for the move, the movement said in a statement in Ramallah: "the free peace-loving people of the world backed the normal and historical rights of the Palestinian people and materialized a great international will to promote justice and human dignity." "The UNGA vote represents a new victory for the principles of freedom, human rights and the peoples' right to self-determination - the same principles on which the UN was founded," according to the statement. Fatah castigated the countries that voted against the Palestinian UN bid and gave precedence to their interests with occupying force (Israel) over the moral values and the liberty of the Palestinian people, saying that history will have not mercy on these countries.