Israel May Sanction Palestinians for Getting UNESCO Recognition

Officials Poised to Approve New Settlement Expansions

The United States was quick to angrily condemn the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization for granting Palestine “full membership status,” revoking all funding to the organization within hours of the vote.

Israel did that too, of course, but with their funding to UNESCO a fairly trivial amount to begin with they’re looking for a response with more impact. And which makes even less sense. Enter Israel’s cabinet, which is meeting tomorrow on responses.

Step one appears to be a plan for a round of new sanctions and other punitive measures against the Palestinians to punish them for being recognized, including that old Israeli favorite of temporarily halting the transfer of tax dollars to the Palestinian Authority.

But that’s not all. Officials also say that a bunch of new settlement construction plans which were previously considered too controversial to pass (which must really be saying something considering the previous projects) will be quickly greenlighted in another effort to spite the PA for praising the recognition.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.