Donald Trump calls United Nations resolution on Jewish settlements "unfair" to Israelis

President-elect Donald Trump is calling on the United Nations to stay out of the longstanding Israel-Palestine dispute over new Jewish settlements.

 "The resolution being considered at the United Nations Security Council regarding Israel should be vetoed," Trump said in a statement Thursday.

The resolution, which is opposed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, calls on Israel to stop building controversial settlements in the West Bank. 

"Egypt, on Wednesday, circulated the draft resolution, which would demand that Israel 'immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem,'" CNBC reported, 

A Security Council vote is scheduled for Thursday afternoon.

Trump issued an official statement Thursday morning rejecting the U.N.'s work on the matter: "As the United States has long maintained, peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians will only come through direct negotiations between the parties, and not through the imposition of terms by the United Nations."

He continued, "This puts Israel in a very poor negotiating position and is extremely unfair to all Israelis."

Politico offered some context, projecting how discussion on the issue may proceed. "In the past, the United States has vetoed such measures, saying they are unfair to Israel," the website reported. "But it was not immediately clear how Samantha Power, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, would vote on Thursday."

Trump, who recently named attorney David Friedman as his choice for U.S. ambassador to Israel, favors moving the American embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv.

Friedman supports the West Bank settlements, which have been seen by a succession of U.S. administrations as an encroachment on post-war lines drawn between Israel and Palestine in 1967.