Palestinians seeks UN membership: Abbas

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Friday he would demand full membership of the United Nations (U.N.) for a Palestinian state when he goes to the UN General Assembly next week, setting up a diplomatic clash with Israel and the United States.“We are going to the Security Council. Once I give my speech at the General Assembly I will submit a request for admission to the Secretary General in order to pass forward to the head of the Security Council. Therefore, our choice is the Security Council. As for the other decisions we have not decided regarding them yet,” Abbas said in a televised speech to rapturous applause from his audience of Palestinian leaders in Ramallah, signalling his determination to press ahead despite efforts by US and European officials to dissuade him.Abbas said recognition as a state would allow a return to peace talks, but on a stronger footing: “We will come back to negotiate on all the other issues, but we want to come back, God willing, God willing, to get a full membership in the Security Council,” he said, noting that the Palestinian people should enjoy like the rest of the people of this earth freedom and liberty in a Palestinian State on the borders of the 4th of June 1967 with East Jerusalem as its capital.”Washington has already said it will veto any statehood resolution in the Security Council and some US politicians have said they will try to cut American aid to the Palestinians, totalling some $500 million a year, if they refuse to back down.Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s spokesman, in an interview ahead of Abbas’s speech, said that the Palestinians have been continuously avoiding direct talks with Israel.