UN Secretary-General Calls Netanyahu Ethnic Cleansing Statement "Outrageous" (but Jew-free Palestine OK)

Speaking on September 15, 2016 at a periodic meeting of the UN Security Council on the Middle East, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's September 9, 2016 video noting that the Palestinian aim to remove all Jews from the West Bank amounts to "ethnic-cleansing" and "ethnic cleansing for peace is absurd." Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas made this aim explicit in July 2013 when he boasted to the interim Egyptian President while on a visit to Cairo: "In a final resolution, we would not see the presence of a single Israeli – civilian or soldier – on our lands."

In the words of the Secretary-General to the Security Council:

"I am disturbed by a recent statement by Israel's Prime Minister portraying those who oppose settlement expansion as supporters of ethnic cleansing. This is unacceptable and outrageous."

But the Secretary-General had nothing to say about Abbas's statement on September 11, 2016 accusing Israel of "ethnic cleansing, premeditated killings and violation of holy sites, turning it into an object of criticism across the entire world."