U.N. Condemns Trump’s Jerusalem Decision Despite Threats From U.S.

Taking names. Photo: Eduardo Munoz Alvarez/AFP/Getty Images

Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said in a speech Thursday that the Trump administration may strip funding from the international body if it votes to condemn its move to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. The General Assembly passed the resolution anyway.

“The United States will remember this day in which it was singled out for attack in the General Assembly,” Haley said in a speech before the vote. “We will remember it when we are called upon to, once again, make the world’s largest contribution to the United Nations.”

“America will put our embassy in Jerusalem,” she said. “That is what the American people want us to do, and it is the right thing to do. No vote in the United Nations will make any difference on that. But this vote will make a difference in how Americans view the U.N.”

The threat follows a warning to member nations from President Trump Wednesday. Those who vote for the resolution, which was drafted by Yemen and Turkey and calls on the U.S. to rescind the Jerusalem move, could lose U.S. aide, Trump said.

“Let them vote against us, we’ll save a lot,” Trump said. “We don’t care. This isn’t like it used to be where they could vote against you and then you pay them hundreds of millions of dollars and nobody knows what they’re doing.”

Prior to that, Haley warned that the U.S. would be “taking names” of those who vote for condemnation.

These warnings from the U.S. were ignored by the 128 nations that voted for the resolution. Another 35 nations abstained, and 9 nations voted against it. “History records names, it remembers names — the names of those who stand by what is right and the names of those who speak falsehood,” Riad Malki, the Palestinian foreign minister, said prior to the vote. “Today we are seekers of rights and peace.”

A similar resolution was first put up for a vote at the Security Council on Monday, but it was vetoed after the U.S. struck it down. All of the 14 other nations on the council voted in favor of it.

U.N. Condemns Trump’s Jerusalem Decision