Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali recommended Tuesday that the Security Council take "whatever measures are required" to force Israel to return nearly 400 deported Palestinians.
In Jerusalem, Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin accused the United Nations of exercising a double standard against Israel. Israel's U.N. ambassador, Gad Yaacobi, said Boutros-Ghali's stance was "one-sided and totally ignores the background" behind the expulsion of alleged Muslim radicals last month.The Palestine Liberation Organization's U.N. office said it was working on a resolution to impose international sanctions on Israel to force it to comply.
The United States, however, indicated it would block such a resolution. Officials in Washington said Monday they had told Arab governments the United States wanted the dispute settled by the parties.
In a report released at U.N. Headquarters, Boutros-Ghali said Israel's refusal to take back the deportees "challenges the authority of the Security Council." He recommended that the council "take whatever measures are required to ensure that its unanimous decision . . . is respected."
The 15-nation council voted unanimously Dec. 18 to adopt a resolution demanding that Israel return the Palestinians.
Israel expelled 415 men on Dec. 17 as alleged members of the radical Muslim fundamentalist Hamas and Islamic Jihad movements. The expulsion was in retaliation for a series of attacks, including the slayings of six security troopers, that were blamed on Hamas.
Fourteen men deported in error have since returned and five others were hospitalized, leaving 396 stranded in a tent camp north of the Israeli security zone in southern Lebanon. Lebanon has refused them passage north.
In his report, Boutros-Ghali, an Egyptian, also said he would start discussions with Israel about putting U.N. monitors in the Israeli-occupied territories to ensure Palestinians' rights were respected.
Israel's Foreign Ministry rejected those recommendations; Palestinians applauded them.