Israel has asked Washington to intervene to prevent any United Nations Security Council resolution after the U.N.'s highest court ruled its West Bank barrier illegal, Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said on Saturday. "The issue will go to the Security Council because the (Palestinians) have an automatic majority in the U.N. General Assembly," Shalom told Israel Radio, adding that he had asked U.S. officials to prevent any resolution being adopted. U.S. officials also made clear after the International Court of Justice at the Hague issued its non-binding advisory opinion Friday that they opposed the U.N.'s involvement on the issue. "We do not believe that that's the appropriate forum to resolve what is a political issue," said White House spokesman Scott McClellan, adding it should be resolved through an internationally-backed "road map" to peace. Meanwhile, in fresh violence Saturday a 16-year-old Palestinian girl was killed by Israeli army gunfire near the Gaza-Egypt border, relatives and medics said. At the United Nations, Arab envoys said the Palestinians would ask the General Assembly next week to adopt a non-binding resolution affirming the court's ruling. Nabil Abu Rdainah, a senior adviser to Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, said the Palestinians would use the decision to push the U.N. Security Council and General Assembly -- which requested the ruling -- to "isolate and punish" Israel. Israel vowed to press on with the barrier it says has stopped Palestinian bombers from infiltrating its cities from the West Bank and killing hundreds of citizens. Palestinians call the barrier, which has separated thousands from their fields, schools and hospitals, an "apartheid wall" that will deny them a viable state. The Palestinians later intend to take their case to the 15-nation Security Council, where the United States -- Israel's main ally, vetoed a resolution last October that sought to bar the Jewish state from extending the West Bank barrier. Nasser al-Kidwa, the U.N. Palestinian observer, declined to say whether he would push for sanctions against Israel. Shi Jiuyong of China, head of the World Court, said Israel had to dismantle the barrier that will eventually stretch for some 600 km (370-mile), and pay compensation to those that had lost their homes and land. "The wall ... cannot be justified by military exigencies or by the requirements of national security or public order," Shi said in the ruling. The court said the barrier -- mostly razor-tipped fences but with portions of cement walls -- "severely impeded" Palestinian rights to self-rule. About one-third of the barrier has been built but the planned route curves at points deep into the West Bank around Jewish settlements constructed on land Israel occupied in the 1967 Middle East war. An American judge on the 15-member panel in The Hague opposed the ruling, saying not enough account had been taken of Israel's security concerns and that the court did not have "the requisite factual basis for its sweeping findings." Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon made no comment. His spokesman Raanan Gissin called the ruling -- hailed by Arafat as a Palestinian victory -- unjust and said it "will find its place in the garbage can of history." **PHOTO CAPTION*** A 16-year-old Palestinian girl was killed by Israeli fire in the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah Saturday, Palestinian medics said. Here an Israeli army post in Gaza. (AFP)