Riyadh, August 22 (QNA) - The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) on Saturday condemned Israel's continued settlement plans in the occupied West Bank, including the E1 settlement project, warning that pursuing such plans constitutes a flagrant challenge to international law and a systematic undermining of the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people.

GCC Secretary-General Jasem Mohamed Albudaiwi stressed that such practices by Israeli occupation forces would undermine prospects for peace and threaten international and regional efforts to establish an independent Palestinian state.

He called on the international community to take serious and responsible action to halt Israel's settlement policies and plans and to oppose any measures aimed at altering the geographic and demographic character of the occupied Palestinian territories.

Albudaiwi reaffirmed the GCC's steadfast support for the Palestinian people's right to establish an independent state within the June 4, 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital, in accordance with the Arab Peace Initiative and relevant international legitimacy resolutions. (QNA)