Israel/Palestine : Israel pushes forward with 1200 homes in East Jerusalem settlements

The new homes in Pisgat Zeev are among those Israel ordered to be fast-tracked last year. Photograph : Sebastian Scheiner/AP

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Israel says it is pushing forward with the construction of more than 1200 new homes in Jewish settlements, in an apparent warning to the Palestinians to rethink their plan to ask the United Nations to recognise an independent state of Palestine.

The Israeli government announced late on Monday that it was accepting bids from contractors to build the homes in two Jewish enclaves in East Jerusalem, Ramot and Pisgat Zeev. The homes are among 1,200 whose construction Israel ordered to be fast-tracked in November 2011 after a key UN body granted full membership to Palestine.

While construction would take months to begin, officials indicated that the timing of the tenders was meant to signal to the Palestinians that they should consider the possible consequences of their plan to ask the UN general assembly later this month to upgrade their status to non-member observer state.

Asked whether this was a sign of what could come, an Israeli official said if the Palestinians went to the general assembly it would be a "blow to peace" and cause problems. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to discuss the matter with reporters.

Senior Palestinian official Saeb Erekat condemned the Israeli action and urged the US to pressure Israel to halt settlement construction. "What you need to stop is not the Palestinian efforts at the UN," he said. "What you need to stop are these settlement activities that are destroying and undermining the possibility of a two-state solution."

Earlier this week, the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, urged the Palestinian president, Mahmud Abbas, to resume negotiations without preconditions. "Peace may be advanced only around the negotiating table and not via unilateral decisions in the UN general assembly, which will only push peace further away and will only lead to instability," Netanyahu said.

Netanyahu met with his security cabinet on Tuesday to discuss possible responses to the UN bid. There was no word on any decisions. Following last year’s move by the Palestinians to join the UN cultural agency, Unesco, Israel retaliated by accelerating settlement construction and withholding funds from the Palestinian government. The US also withheld money from the Palestinians, and the US Congress has threatened similar sanctions if the Palestinians proceed at the UN again.

The Palestinians say the appeal to the UN is not designed to replace peace talks, which broke down four years ago. They argue that with talks stalled, they have to look for other ways to push their claims to establish a state in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip.

The 193-member general assembly is dominated by countries sympathetic to the Palestinian cause and the petition for a status upgrade is assured. Last year, the Palestinians failed to receive the necessary UN security council support for their bid to become a full member state.