Ahlul Bayt News Agency ; Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas said Tuesday that Israel should impose a new moratorium on settlement building in the occupied West Bank for as long as “peace talks” are continuing.
Abbas gave US mediation more time to work when he announced Monday he wouldn't decide whether to abandon the talks before consulting senior Arab officials in Cairo next week. An Arab League official has told The Associated Press that Arab foreign ministers were expected to endorse whatever position Abbas took.
Speaking in an interview with the French radio station Europe 1 in Paris on Tuesday, Abbas said Israel's decision to allow the 10-month construction freeze to expire had endangered the so-called Middle East peace process.
"We demand a moratorium for as long as there are negotiations, because for as long as there are negotiations there is hope," he said, speaking in Arabic through a French translator. Abbas has said that the Palestinians will give their official response to the end of the freeze next week once he has met the Palestinian executive and representatives of major Arab governments.
"We don't want to stop these negotiations but if settlement building continues, we will be obliged to stop," Abbas said, adding that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu "should understand that peace is more important than settlement building."
US DISPATCHES MITCHELL TO M.E.
Netanyahu's refusal to renew the moratorium has threatened to derail faltering talks and has drawn widespread criticism, including from the US, Britain, the European Union, France and the United Nations but did nothing to pressure Israel. The international community views all settlements as illegal.
US envoy George Mitchell headed to the Middle East on Tuesday to try to “rescue” the talks as voices of disappointment were raised around the world that Israel didn’t extend the freeze.
Netanyahu, who has not said anything publicly about the end of the settlement construction moratorium since it expired at midnight on Sunday, is scheduled to meet with Mitchell on Wednesday.
PRAISES AND CHIDES
Netanyahu and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton held talks by telephone late Monday that were described by State Department spokesman Philip Crowley as "very significant, very detailed, very direct."
Crowley praised Abbas for not immediately walking out of the talks and chided Israel for resisting international pressure to halt new housing starts in the West Bank.
"We are disappointed but we remain focused on our long-term objective and will be talking to the parties about the implications of the Israeli decision," Crowley said Monday, adding that Mitchell would "sort through with the parties where we go from here."
Israel's hardline Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, meanwhile, said Palestinian negotiators had "wasted time" during the settlement moratorium but added that it was important to "keep the political process alive." For "nine months the Palestinians wasted time and completely refused to accept this gesture and accused Israel that it's a fraud, it's not serious," Lieberman said after meeting with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. "And today they are exerting pressure to maintain the same moratorium that they previously rejected," he told reporters in New York.
The Palestinians have previously called on Israel to extend the moratorium for three to four months so that the two sides can reach an agreement on final “borders” that would clarify where “Israel” can continue building.
Netanyahu has refused to renew the partial freeze, but has urged Abbas to stick with the talks, which were relaunched after a 20-month hiatus.
Hamas resistance movement called on Abbas to stand by his threat to end the negotiations, which the movement has always vehemently rejected. "I call on my brothers at the Palestinian Authority, who had stated they would not pursue talks with the enemy (Israel) if it continued settlement construction, to hold to their promise," its exiled chief Khaled Meshaal said.
Russia expressed "serious concern" at the expiry of freeze on Israeli settlements, calling on the Israelis and Palestinians not to jeopardize peace talks with unilateral action. "This is bad for talks, for the political atmosphere in the region and for the prospects of establishing a fair and long-lasting peace there," foreign ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko said in a statement published Tuesday.
The Middle East Quartet (Russia, the United States, the United Nations and the European Union) appealed during a March meeting in Moscow for a peace agreement within two years, leading to a two-state solution.
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