US has threatened to veto any Palestinian application for full membership of the UN or go to the General Assembly for enhanced observer membership this month.
Infuriated over Palestinian leaders' drive for statehood, the US today warned them that they cannot achieve it by passing of a resolution at the United Nations and insisted that the best way to get it is through negotiations with Israel.
"The Palestinians will not, and cannot, achieve statehood through a declaration at the United Nations. It is a distraction, and it's counterproductive," White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters.
"That remains our position. We continue to be focused with great intensity on the need to get Israelis and Palestinians together again in direct negotiations, because that is the path towards a two-state solution and Palestinian statehood," he said.
President Barack Obama, he said, believes that the only way to resolve the issues between the Palestinians and the Israelis and to ultimately create a Palestinian state is through direct negotiations.
US has threatened to veto any Palestinian application for full membership of the UN or go to the General Assembly for enhanced observer membership this month.
In San Francisco, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned Palestinians that their effort is shortsighted and cannot succeed, saying the road to peace and two states living side by side does not go through New York.
"It goes through Jerusalem and Ramallah," she said.
"It is our absolute conviction that we need to get the parties back into negotiations on a direct face-to-face basis and that they have to be at that negotiating table working through the framework that President Obama laid out in May. That remains our focus. We are absolutely committed to pursuing that," Clinton said.
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