EU urges Israel to rethink settlement plans Sat Sep 5, 11:58 am ET
STOCKHOLM (AFP) – The European Union on Saturday urged Israel to scrap plans to build new Jewish settlements in the West Bank, saying that would boost chances of fresh peace talks with the Palestinians.The negotiations with Israel have not finished and we have some weeks to go. I hope very much that we'll be able to get a change of that position on Israeli settlements during the UN general assembly in New York next month, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said.We are very disappointed by some of the statements referred to in the last hours, said Solana, speaking in Stockholm at an informal meeting of EU foreign ministers.I hope very much that (Israel's plan) will not be realised,he added.
The Swedish EU presidency agreed.
Foreign Minister Carl Bildt said Europe had very strong support for the American approach, notably regarding the settlements. They're illegal, they are an impediment to the peace process.Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he will consider a construction moratorium for a few months as demanded by Washington only after the green light is given to build hundreds of new homes in the occupied West Bank.The announcement was sharply denounced by the Palestinians.On Saturday in Cairo, Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said there was no point in meeting Netanyahu if the Israeli premier approves a fast expansion of settlements before considering a freeze.Abbas and Netanyahu have not met since the latter took over as the head of a right-wing Israeli government in early April.US President Barack Obama has, with the support of Europe, called for a total freeze on settlements in a bid to revive the peace talks that have been suspended since the end of 2008.
Holy city twist: Arabs moving into Jewish areas By BEN HUBBARD, Associated Press Writer – Sat Sep 5, 10:25 am ET
JERUSALEM – Yousef Majlaton moved into the Jerusalem neighborhood of Pisgat Zeev for such comforts as proper running water and regular garbage pickup. But he represents a potentially volatile twist in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute over the holy city.
The hillside sprawl of townhouses and apartment blocks was built for Jews, and Majlaton is a Palestinian.Pisgat Zeev is part of Israel's effort to fortify its presence in Jerusalem's eastern half which it captured in the 1967 war.But Majlaton, his wife and three kids are among thousands who have crossed the housing lines to Pisgat Zeev and neighborhoods like it in a migration that is raising tempers among some Jewish residents.It wasn't so much the politics of this contested city that drew Majlaton to Pisgat Zeev, however; it was the prospect of escaping the potholed roads and scant municipal services he endured for 19 years while renting in an Arab neighborhood.You see that air conditioner? he said, pointing to the large wall unit cooling his living room.In the Arab areas, the electricity is too weak to run one that big.Majlaton, 50, says some Jewish neighbors are warming up to him, but the influx bothers others, who say they're thinking of moving out or refuse to sell or rent to Arabs.This is much more than a simple matter of real estate. Demographics could figure heavily in how Jerusalem is partitioned in a future peace deal. If that happens, it is expected the city will be split along ethnic lines — Jewish neighborhoods to Israel, Arab neighborhoods to Palestine.Palestinians see east Jerusalem as their future capital. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vows the whole city will remain united as Israel's capital.Palestinians have long accused those among them who sell land to Jews of betraying their homeland, and last week similar language was heard from a group of rabbis. Meeting in Pisgat Zeev, they issued an edict denouncing Jews who sell land to Arabs as traitors and barring them from participating in communal prayers.
This is a war, and if the Arabs conquer one neighborhood, they will conquer others and they will strangle the Jews,said Hillel Weiss, a spokesman for the New Sanhedrin,which takes its name from the supreme court of ancient Israel.In 2007, the latest year with available statistics, about 1,300 of Pisgat Zeev's 42,000 residents were Arabs. In nearby French Hill, population 7,000, nearly one-sixth are Arabs, among them students at the neighboring Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Neve Yaakov, with 20,000 people, had 600 Arabs, according to the Israel Center for Jerusalem Studies, a respected think tank.Weeks after the 1967 war, Israel annexed east Jerusalem with its major Jewish, Muslim and Christian holy sites in a move recognized by no other country. It continues to build housing in sensitive areas in defiance of U.S. protests.Netanyahu says Arabs have the right to live anywhere in the city, and so should Jews, though the Old City's Jewish Quarter is closed to Arabs.Jerusalem's mayor and city councilors are all Jewish. Almost all the city's Arabs refuse to vote or run in municipal elections, saying that would be recognition of Israeli rule. But it deprives them of clout in competition for city spending.
Today, while west Jerusalem is overwhelmingly Jewish, the eastern half is an ethnic checkerboard. More than 180,000 Jews live there, most in places like Pisgat Zeev but also in enclaves in Arab areas. Nearly all the city's 220,000 Palestinians live in eastern neighborhoods.Ironically, much of the Arab migration was set off by the separation barrier which Israel started building through the West Bank in 2002 during a wave of suicide bombings. Its Jerusalem segment meanders to scoop up as many Jewish areas as possible and make several Arab neighborhoods a part of the West Bank.The wall stranded tens of thousands of Jerusalem Arabs on the West Bank side, and many moved to Arab neighborhoods on the Jerusalem side for easier access to jobs and schools. But a housing shortage in those districts is pushing the overflow into Jewish areas, residents and real estate agents said.These areas are less crowded, you can live in a house, and there are streets, parks and places to play, said Moukhless Abu el-Hof, an Israeli Arab lawyer who owns a home in Pisgat Zeev.In the Arab neighborhoods, there's nothing.Jewish resident Shlomi Cohen, 37, said the Arab influx made him sell up and move elsewhere in Pisgat Zeev.If an Arab comes to live in the building and someone wants to buy and he knows there is an Arab there, he will not buy,he said.
Yael Antebi, editor of the Pisgat Zeev community newspaper and a Jerusalem city council member, said Arab and Jewish teens sometimes brawl, Arab youth often harass Jewish girls, and parents fear their daughters will date Arabs. Majlaton and his wife are both Hebrew-speaking Christians. He said his new neighbors cold-shouldered them when they arrived in 2002, but gradually became friendlier.He said he has since helped about 30 Arab families to move in and gets calls from prospective renters almost every day.While his primary motivation was quality of life, he says living in Pisgat Zeev is a nationalistic act — a way to cement Arab presence in the city of his birth.He said Palestinian leaders should follow his lead.They should bring all the Arabs to Pisgat Zeev,he said.I'll help them find homes one by one.AP correspondent Amy Teibel contributed to this report.
Abbas rejects Netanyahu talks if settlements grow by Ines Bel Aiba – Sat Sep 5, 10:16 am ET
CAIRO (AFP) – Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said on Saturday he sees no point in meeting Benjamin Netanyahu if the Israeli premier approves a fast expansion of West Bank settlements before considering a freeze.Abbas, in Cairo for talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, told reporters that such a move by Netanyahu, who has been under US pressure to halt settlement construction, would mean he was not serious about peace talks.It would mean that he doesn't want to do anything, and there's no need to meet him,Abbas said, insisting again that Israel should freeze settlements as a first step to peace negotiations.An Israeli government official told AFP on Friday that Netanyahu will approve the construction of hundreds of homes in West Bank settlements before implementing a freeze.Netanyahu would place a moratorium on settlement expansion for a few months after the green light is given to build the new homes, the official said.The announcement drew outrage from the Palestinians, while the United States, which is trying to broker peace between Israel and the Palestinians, said it was inconsistent with peace efforts.Israeli President Shimon Peres told Fox News in an interview last week that Obama might host a meeting with Abbas and Netanyahu on the sidelines of a UN General Assembly meeting in New York later this month.
The United States wants the conflict to end with a Palestinian state alongside Israel while Arab countries recognise the Jewish state with full diplomatic and trade relations.But Arab states have ruled out taking any steps until Israel freezes settlements and begins substantive talks with the Palestinians.The Palestinians, however, are divided into two rival camps, the Islamist Hamas movement controlling the Gaza Strip and Abbas's Fatah running the Palestinian Authority in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.Egypt has been brokering a reconciliation deal between the Palestinians aimed at creating a transitional unity government ahead of general elections next year.Egypt, which has so far failed to achieve an agreement, will propose a new initiative by the end of the week, Abbas said, without giving further details.Khaled Meshaal, Damascus-based leader of Hamas, was scheduled to arrive in Cairo later on Saturday to meet Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman the following day for talks focussing on reconciliation and a prisoner exchange with Israel.Egypt is also trying to set up a deal under which Israel would release more than a thousand prisoners in exchange for Gilad Shalit, an Israeli soldier captured in a 2006 cross-border raid from Gaza and held by Hamas.Egyptian and Hamas officials were downplaying reports of an imminent deal ahead of Meshaal's visit.
THE MORE THE WORLD TELLS ISRAELI LEADERS WHAT TO DO,THE MORE AND WORSE THE JUDGEMENTS GETS ON THE WORLDS NATIONS.
US harshly rebukes Israel on settlement plans By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer – Sat Sep 5, 1:04 am ET
WASHINGTON – Alarmed by Israeli plans to build new housing units in settlements and dimming prospects for American peace efforts, the Obama administration on Friday put out a rare and harsh public rebuke of its main Mideast ally.The White House said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's settlement plans were inconsistent with commitments the Jewish state has made previously and harmful to U.S. attempts to lay the groundwork for a resumption in peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians.
United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued settlement expansion and we urge that it stop,White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said in a statement.We are working to create a climate in which negotiations can take place, and such actions make it harder to create such a climate.Netanyahu's aides, speaking on condition of anonymity Friday because the plans have not been formally announced, said any Israeli settlement freeze would not halt building the new units and or block completion of some 2,500 others currently under construction. They also said the freeze would not include east Jerusalem, which the Palestinians hope to make their future capital.The unusually blunt White House criticism reflected the administration's growing frustration with Netanyahu, whose decision would approve hundreds of new housing units in West Bank settlements before considering even a temporary freeze in construction, as President Barack Obama has requested.The White House typically refrains from commenting on such moves until they are formally announced. But in this case, U.S. officials said they acted because Mideast peace envoy George Mitchell had already been briefed on the Israeli plans earlier in the week.State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said Mitchell and the Israelis had been having a very open dialogue in very intense discussions.He would not elaborate.
But one U.S. official familiar with Mitchell's Wednesday meeting in New York with Netanyahu envoy Yitzhak Molcho and Israeli Defense Ministry chief of staff Michael Herzog said the Israelis told Mitchell they were going to do it and he told them they could expect a sharp response.The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive diplomatic exchange, said the meeting had not gone well.The official added that the White House statement was released before a formal Israeli announcement of Netanyahu's plans because we wanted to send a strong signal early on.
Publicly, the State Department had described Mitchell's discussion with the Israeli delegation — which came after his talks with Netanyahu a week earlier in London — as a good meeting.The department said Mitchell would travel again to the Middle East next week to follow up. That trip is still on, officials said Friday.The process will continue,said one. The official also noted that the statement was not entirely negative and expressed appreciation for Israel's stated intent to place limits on settlement activity.We are working with all parties — Israelis, Palestinians, and Arab states — on the steps they must take to achieve that objective,said Gibbs.
Netanyahu's refusal to bend on the settlement issue despite repeated U.S. appeals threatens to damage Obama's credibility in the Arab world. The administration is counting on Arab support for a resumption in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations but will not likely get it unless Netanyahu makes concessions on settlements.The Palestinians have said they will not sit down for talks unless there is a settlement freeze and Arab leaders have made similar demands.
Chavez tells Israelis to disobey genocidal govt By ALBERT AJI, Associated Press Writer – Fri Sep 4, 7:23 pm ET
DAMASCUS, Syria – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez told the Israeli people not to support their government, which he described as genocidal on Friday, the second day of his trip to Syria.Chavez is on an 11-day trip to Libya, Algeria, Syria, Iran, Belarus, Russia and Spain in what he is describing as a bid to build a multi-polar world and decrease U.S. influence in the region.The Venezuelan president has singled out Israel for criticism during his visit to Syria, slamming it for mistreating the Palestinians and being an agent of U.S. imperialism.The state of Israel has become a murderous lackey at the service of imperialism, Chavez said.It's a genocidal government. I condemn that Zionist government that persecutes the heroic Palestinian people.Chavez, whose remarks were broadcast by state television in Venezuela, added that the people of Israel shouldn't support a genocidal government.Chavez spoke in front of about 10,000 people who gathered at a football stadium in the city of Sweida, some 110 kilometers south of Damascus, near the Jordanian border.More than 200,000 people from the Sweida area carry Venezuelan citizenship and most are members of Syria's Druse sect, who immigrated to Venezuela in the past century.
Chavez later inaugurated a public garden in the city, naming it after 19th century Latin American independence leader Simon Bolivar.The firebrand Latin American leader has built close ties with Iran, Syria, Cuba and other countries while his relations have grown tense with Israel.Chavez strongly criticized Israel's war against Gaza in December and January and said the Jewish state should return to Syria the strategic Golan Heights that it captured in 1967 Mideast war.Chavez also called for Israel to take its hands off Latin America also. Because there the U.S. empire is trying to turn Colombia ... into the Israel of Latin America.Venezuela and Colombia have been feuding for weeks over negotiations between the Colombian government and Washington that would allow the U.S. military to increase its presence at seven Colombian bases through a 10-year lease agreement.Chavez calls the pending deal a threat to Venezuela. Colombia says it's necessary to more effectively help fight drug traffickers and leftist rebels.Later Friday, Chavez arrived in Tehran and praised Iran for standing up to he said were western forces attempts to destabilize it after the elections there. The Iranian opposition alleges the country's June 12 election was rigged in Ahmadinejad's favor and that pro-reform challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi was the true winner.After the election, Iranian security forces, including the Revolutionary Guard and pro-government Basij militia, crushed mass street protests against Ahmadinejad's re-election in a heavy crackdown that prompted heavy criticism from the West.Associated Press writers Ian James and Fabiola Sanchez in Caracas contributed to this report.
U.S., Israel on collision course over settlements By Matt Spetalnick – Fri Sep 4, 2:19 pm ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Israeli government's plan to approve more construction in Jewish settlements drew a sharp rebuke from the Obama administration on Friday, further complicating U.S. efforts to revive Middle East peace talks.The White House reacted with dismay to word that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will authorize the building of several hundred new settler homes on occupied land before considering a freeze on such construction.President Barack Obama has been pressuring Netanyahu's right-leaning government to halt settlement building, a major obstacle in the stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace process, as a prelude to a resumption of the negotiations.The Obama administration has been holding out the prospect of a three-way meeting in New York of Obama, Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas later this month if there is sufficient progress toward resuming peace efforts.
We regret the reports of Israel's plans to approve additional settlement construction,White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said.As the president has said before, the United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued settlement expansion and we urge that it stop. We are working to create a climate in which negotiations can take place, and such actions make it harder to create such a climate,Gibbs said in a statement.It was another sign that the most serious rift in U.S.-Israeli relations in a decade will be hard to bridge as Obama tries to meet his pledge to make Middle East peacemaking a higher priority than his predecessor, George W. Bush.The Palestinians insisted they would accept nothing less than a total freeze on settlement construction in the occupied West Bank, land they want as part of a future state.Netanyahu is also under pressure from many lawmakers in his rightist Likud party to resist Obama's push for a suspension of settlement building.
A Netanyahu aide, who declined to be identified by name, said that after the several hundred housing units are authorized, the Israeli leader would be prepared to consider a moratorium on building that lasted a few months.Israel is already building some 2,500 housing units at West Bank settlements that are in various stages of construction.
PALESTINIANS DEMAND TOTAL FREEZE
Palestinian officials say they will resume talks only if Israel stops all building within Jewish enclaves in the West Bank, in keeping with a 2003 U.S.-backed road map peace plan that also called on the Palestinians to rein in militant attacks on Israelis.Gibbs said, however, that the administration appreciated what it sees as Israel's stated intent to place limits on settlement activity and will continue to discuss this with the Israelis as these limitations are defined.But Nabil Abu Rdainah, an aide to Abbas, said: A partial settlement freeze is not enough.Despite the latest development, a U.S. official said the Obama administration believed it was possible to reach a deal to resume overall peace talks, which have been stalled since December.We still think we can bring this phase to a positive conclusion, including action by Israel on settlements, in the next few weeks,the official said.
Obama's Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, met Netanyahu aides in New York this week to work on a deal to resume talks in time for a possible announcement at the U.N. General Assembly in late September. The official said Mitchell was expected to go to the region again possibly late next week. Obama has taken the public stance that Israel must halt all settlement activity, including so-called natural growth under which new homes are built within existing enclaves to accommodate growing settler families.But U.S. officials privately have hinted at flexibility on the issue if the two sides agree to a compromise. Palestinians say settlements, built on land Israel occupied in a 1967 war, would deny them a viable state.The Obama administration is seeking to bridge the Israeli and Palestinian positions and persuade Arab states to take steps toward normalizing relations with the Jewish state, but it has met resistance over who should make the first move.Obama sees engagement in Palestinian-Israeli peacemaking as crucial to repairing America's image in the Muslim world and drawing moderate Arab states into a united front against Iran.(Additional reporting by Ori Lewis in Jerusalem, Ali Sawafta in Ramallah and Steve Holland and Arshad Mohammed in Washington; Editing by Vicki Allen and Paul Simao)
Shimon Peres says quite optimistic about peace Fri Sep 4, 1:38 pm ET
CERNOBBIO, Italy (AFP) – Israeli President Shimon Peres said Friday he was quite optimistic about peace and downplayed reports that his country will carry on with settlement construction before agreeing to a freeze.I am quite optimistic about peace,Peres, said, evoking the pragmatic approach in all quarters, during a speech to the Ambrosetti Forum grouping political and business leaders on the shore of Lake Como in northern Italy.Peres, who largely holds a ceremonial post, said: All of us are tired with the conflict and we feel time has come to make peace.He brushed aside a report confirmed by an Israeli official saying Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would consider a moratorium on settlement construction for a few months after the green light is given to build hundreds of new homes in the occupied West Bank.
The announcement has sparked immediate Palestinian outrage.
It is not an official statement, it is press speculation I think the aim of Netanyahu is to reach an agreement,he said.Peres said he was fairly confident there would be a meeting between Israeli and Palestinian officials before the end of September to restart negotiations ruptured since the end of last year.I think it should take place, maybe it will take place, I cannot tell you at 100 percent," he said.If you want to start to move, you have to make a step and the time has come to make another step.Israeli media reports said work on 2,500 housing units already under way would continue as part of the plan widely seen as an attempt to appease far right-wing members of Netanyahu's hawkish Likud party.The international community considers all Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian territory to be illegal and a major hurdle to Middle East peace efforts that have been at a standstill since December.
Israel OK for new settler homes outrages Palestinians by Marius Schattner – Fri Sep 4, 1:45 pm ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Israel will approve construction of West Bank settlement homes before it considers a freeze sought by Washington, a top government official said on Friday, sparking Palestinian outrage.The plan was also deemed regrettable by the US administration, which has pushed for a freeze of Jewish settlements in an effort to restart the stalled Middle East peace process.In the next days the prime minister will approve construction starts and then he might consider a freeze for a limited time under certain conditions,the official told AFP, asking not to be identified.He confirmed a Jerusalem Post report saying Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would consider a construction moratorium for a few months after the green light is given to build hundreds of new homes in the occupied West Bank.Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas and top negotiator Saeb Erakat sharply denounced the move.That is not acceptable,Abbas said after talks in Paris with President Nicolas Sarkozy.We want a freeze on settlement and the launch of negotiations on the final phase of it.
Erakat went further, saying the only thing suspended by this announcement will be the peace process.White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Israel's reported plans were inconsistent with its international commitments to the peace process.We regret the reports of Israel's plans to approve additional settlement construction, Gibbs said in a statement.France also expressed its objection saying such a move was totally contrary to Israel's peace commitments.Our position is without any ambiguity. We condemn it,said foreign ministry spokesman Eric Chevallier.EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana meanwhile called on Israel to halt all building work at Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.The international community considers all Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian territory to be illegal and a major hurdle to Middle East peace efforts that have been at a standstill since December.Israeli media said work on 2,500 housing units already under way would continue as part of the plan widely seen as an attempt to appease far right-wing members of Netanyahu's hawkish Likud party.The Jerusalem Post said any temporary moratorium on construction would happen if conditions are right, including if Arab states move forward with the normalisation of ties that Israel is seeking.The Haaretz newspaper said Netanyahu told US officials of his decision to authorise construction a few weeks ago.The Americans do not agree and are not happy about it, but we put it on the table a long time ago,an unnamed senior official told the paper.Israeli media said Netanyahu would take up the issue with Washington's Middle East envoy George Mitchell, who is due to return to the region next week.The mass-selling Yediot Aharonot daily called the move one giant leap for the right wing in Israel, one small step for mankind.
Netanyahu is walking a thin political wire,the paper said.
In order not to bring down on himself a rebellion in the Likud faction, he has to sweeten the suspension pill with promises to approve construction plans for hundreds of housing units before the agreement goes into effect; but he has to do this without betraying the trust of the Americans, without giving the Arab states a good excuse to get out of the agreement.On Thursday, Israel's Channel 2 television said the partial freeze would last for nine months and affect only the West Bank -- home to 300,000 Israelis -- and not east Jerusalem, where a further 200,000 settlers live. The Palestinians have refused to resume peace talks until Israel freezes all construction in the West Bank, including annexed east Jerusalem, which they want as the capital of their future state.Concerning the peace process, we reaffirmed that we were entirely disposed to go forward with negotiations for the final status if Israel stops settlement building,Abbas said in Paris on Thursday.
Israel raps Norway over investment pullout Fri Sep 4, 12:33 pm ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak protested on Friday a decision by Norway's state pension fund to ban an Israeli company from its portfolio for ethical reasons.The defence minister spoke with Norway's foreign affairs minister to express his discontent following the decision by the Norwegian fund over Elbit, a ministry statement said.Norway announced the decision on Thursday, saying it does not want to contribute to violations of international humanitarian law. Israeli group Elbit was accused of providing a surveillance system for the separation wall in the West Bank, which the International Court of Justice ruled illegal in 2004.On the advice of the fund's ethical council, the government asked the central bank, which manages the pension fund, to divest its shares in the company by August 31. The value of the holding was not disclosed.The Israeli foreign ministry on Thursday summoned Norway's ambassador to protest the move.The fund is one of the world's biggest investors.
Peres: Palestinian state first, full peace later By DAN PERRY and ALESSANDRA RIZZO, Associated Press Writers – Fri Sep 4, 12:27 pm ET
CERNOBBIO, Italy – Israeli President Shimon Peres, a longtime advocate of peace with the Palestinians, said Friday that a comprehensive settlement resolving the century-old dispute was not currently achievable.He called instead for a Palestinian state under a provisional arrangement even without a formal peace deal.Israel has decided to make peace on the basis of two states — an Israeli state and a Palestinian state, he told the Ambrosetti Forum, a gathering of political and business leaders on the shores of Italy's Lake Como.I would like that we do it in one step. Apparently we cannot do it in one step.Arab League Secretary-General Amre Moussa, who squared off against Peres at the meeting, expressed skepticism at the gradual approach and said the time for a deal was now or never.He warned that if Israel didn't move quickly it would find momentum will have shifted away from the two-state idea towards a single state of Israelis and Palestinians in which Jews would not dominate — effectively ending the state of Israel.The testiness of the encounter between two veterans, who each represent relatively moderate forces among their peoples, illustrated starkly how far apart the sides remain even as they brace for an expected initiative by the Obama administration in coming weeks aimed at restarting negotiations for a regional Middle East peace.In the run-up, the U.S. has been trying to nudge Israel toward a total freeze on Jewish settlement construction on occupied land, in exchange for various gestures from some Arab nations toward normalization with Israel. The difficulty has been compounded by the fact that in March a right-leaning government replaced the previous more moderate one in Israel.
Several months ago, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reluctantly agreed to accept the principle of a Palestinian state — a position his predecessors had already adopted but his Likud party has not — but said it would have to have limits on its rights to have a military or control its airspace.On Friday, aides to Netanyahu told The Associated Press that he would also agree to a temporary settlement freeze — but only after approving hundreds of new housing units and completing 2,500 other still under construction.The aides, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that contrary to the U.S. position the freeze would not include east Jerusalem, which Israel occupied in 1967 and has since annexed but which the Palestinians see as the capital of their future state.Moussa bitterly condemned these proposals, saying they would suspend the peace process" if enacted, and said that Netanyahu's interpretation of a Palestinian state makes a Palestinian state a farce therefore the offer cannot be accepted.He said the Arab League's 2002 offer to Israel — full regional peace in exchange for a full withdrawal from all areas occupied in 1967 and a solution to the question of Palestinian refugees — remained in effect.We are ready to recognize Israel, to normalize with Israel,if Israel met the Arab conditions, Moussa said.Peres, a Nobel Peace laureate and former Israeli prime minister, countered that peace is not based on ultimatums but on compromises and noted that the issues of Jerusalem and of the refugees — who, together with their descendants, number in the millions — were extremely difficult to resolve.
If we have to write it down on paper then we will immediately have an explosion,he said.We can move on two different tracks (and) solve the refugee problem in itself.
Moussa said that if Israel continued building settlements in the West Bank and dragging its feet the sides may pass the point of no return.Time is not on our side and it is certainly not on the side of Israel,he said.The idea of two states is losing in favor of one state. There is a possibility that a Palestinian state would not be viable. In that case the only possibility is one state — not a Jewish state, not an Arab state ... a state of its citizens.Moussa referred to the idea that the West Bank and Gaza may become so demographically entwined with Israel that they would have to form a single entity — and one in which, by current birthrate trends, the Arab population may well soon exceed that of the Jews, who number about 5.5 million in today's Israel.If we do not move in the next few months under the Obama initiative ... we will have to put the whole (Israeli-Palestinian) file before the international community,Moussa said, alluding to the possibility that the Arabs would conclude some two decades of peace efforts had simple gone nowhere. Peres — pushing the boundaries on a role that is meant to be ceremonial and somewhat above the political and diplomatic fray — argued that even the borders initially delineated for the Palestinian state could be considered provisional and ultimately expanded.You want us to believe that? thundered the urbane Moussa.Another one of the tricks!
Shalit's parents given letter from Sarkozy Fri Sep 4, 9:42 am ET
HILA, Israel (AFP) – The parents of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit held captive for three years by Palestinian militants were given a letter from French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Friday.In the letter, delivered by France's new ambassador to Israel Christophe Bigot to the Shalits at their northern Israel home, Sarkozy said France will continue to act tirelessly in close coordination with Israel authorities in order that he be released.In his letter dated August 28, the day Shalit turned 23, Sarkozy called his detention unacceptable.Shalit, who also holds French citizenship, was seized in June 2006 in a deadly cross-border raid from the Gaza Strip conducted by three Palestinian armed groups, including Hamas which now rules the coastal territory.
Hamas chief in Cairo for talks on unity deal Fri Sep 4, 9:00 am ET
CAIRO (AFP) – Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal will arrive in Cairo on Saturday for talks on Palestinian unity and on a prisoner exchange with Israel, Palestinian and Egyptian officials said on Friday.Meshaal's trip will coincide with a visit by his rival, Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, who will meet with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.Egypt is brokering unity talks between the Islamist movement and Abbas's Fatah party, but senior Fatah official Nabil Shaath ruled out a meeting between Meshaal and Abbas in Cairo.Abbas would like to see Meshaal once the agreement has been closed or about to close. He has decided not to meet him until then, Shaath said.The two groups have been bitterly divided since Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip in June 2007, routing Abbas's Fatah from the enclave.
Meshaal's talks with Omar Suleiman, Egypt's intelligence chief and pointman in the reconciliation talks, are likely to focus on a deal to exchange a captured Israeli soldier in Gaza for more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners.Israel refuses to lift its blockade of Gaza, imposed after Hamas seized power there, until the release of sergeant Gilad Shalit, captured in a cross-border raid in 2006.Hamas and Israel fought a devastating war in Gaza over the New Year, which ended with separate ceasefires, but the two failed to agree on a truce after Israel said Shalit should first be released.Hamas and Egyptian officials downplayed reports of a breakthrough in the talks, which would release Palestinian militants convicted of attacks against Israelis, ahead of Meshaal's visit.Palestinian unification and achieving a stable truce in Gaza have become more urgent as US President Barack Obama pushes for a lasting peace in the region.
Israeli warplanes strike southern Gaza Thu Sep 3, 7:36 pm ET
GAZA CITY (AFP) – Israeli warplanes struck the Gaza Strip early on Friday near the southern city of Khan Yunis, Palestinian and Israeli officials said.The air strike targeted a tunnel under Israel's security barrier that was to be used to infiltrate Palestinian militants, an Israeli military spokeswoman said.Palestinian security officials confirmed the air strike, adding that no one was injured.Five mortar rounds were fired from the Gaza Strip at Israel on Thursday without causing damage or casualties, according to the Israeli military.Two exploded inside Israeli territory, a third landed near the Karni crossing point into the Palestinian enclave and the other two hit near the border fence on the Palestinian side, a military spokesman said.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned on several occasions that the Israeli army would respond to each rocket or shell fired into Israel.
According to the army more than 200 rockets and shells have been fired from Gaza since Israel's 22-day offensive against the Hamas rulers of the territory in December and January.Operation Cast Lead, which led to more than 1,400 Palestinian deaths including hundreds of civilians and which devastated swathes of the coastal strip, was officially aimed at ending the firing of rockets from Gaza.
Five mortar bombs fired at Israel from Gaza: army Thu Sep 3, 1:31 pm ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Five mortar rounds were fired from the Gaza Strip at Israel on Thursday without causing damage or casualties, an Israeli military spokesman said.
Two exploded inside Israeli territory, a third landed near the Karni crossing point into the Palestinian enclave and the other two hit near the border fence on the Palestinian side, he said.Militants also shot at Israeli soldiers protecting people working near the security fence, again without causing casualties, the spokesman said.On one occasion, soldiers returned fire without being able to say if they hit anyone, he added.Israel said the primary aim of its three-week onslaught on Gaza in December and January was to stop rocket and mortar fire from the territory.Operation Cast Lead" caused the deaths of more than 1,400 Palestinians and devastated the infrastructure of the impoverished enclave where 1.5 million people live.Gaza has been under the control of the Islamist group Hamas since June, 2007.
Israelis meet US Mideast envoy Thu Sep 3, 12:51 am ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Israeli officials met US envoy George Mitchell to discuss the two sides' commitment to comprehensive peace in the Middle East, a State Department official said.But the US official did not mention whether the group discussed the future of Jewish settlements in the West Bank.President Barack Obama's administration, backed by European nations, has pushed Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu for a complete halt to settlements, to pave the way for a resumption of peace talks suspended late last year.Senator Mitchell had a good meeting with the prime minister's envoy and the Defense Ministry chief of staff (Michael Herzog), State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said in a brief statement, describing the meeting as a follow-up to Mitchell's talks with Netanyahu last week in London.
Senator Mitchell and the Israeli delegation reaffirmed their commitment to comprehensive peace, and concrete steps by all parties toward that goal. We look forward to continuing the discussion when Senator Mitchell returns to the region late next week,Kelly added.An Israeli diplomat earlier told AFP that the talks were being held as the two sides move toward an understanding on settlements.The Israeli diplomat said on the condition of anonymity ahead of the talks that there's a very good will on both sides to reach an encompassing understanding on the settlements issue, and that the sides were trying to work out the length, scope, exit strategy, (and) what happens after such a freeze, should it be agreed upon.The diplomat said the United States is also trying to get the Palestinians and Arab states to offer something in a bid to revive Israeli-Palestinian negotiations that stalled at the end of the administration of George W. Bush.Washington has called for Arab states to take steps toward normalizing ties with Israel.
