By KHALED ABU TOAMEH, JPOST—
US Secretary of State John Kerry urged Israel on Wednesday to limit settlement building, an issue that is weighing on Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
Friction over the talks has risen this past week on the back of Israeli plans, announced in tandem with its release of 26 Palestinian prisoners, for some 3,500 new homes for settlers in the West Bank and east Jerusalem.
“Let me emphasize at this point the position of the United States of America on the settlements is that we consider them… to be illegitimate,” Kerry said after discussions with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Kerry made the comments in responding to Palestinian frustration over Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank and stressed that “at no time” did the Palestinians agree to accept the settlements as a part of a negotiated peace accord.
Kerry, faced with grim Israeli and Palestinian assessments of progress in peace talks, said on Wednesday that Washington was not giving up on a deal.
“As in any negotiation there will be moments of up and moments of down, and it goes back and forth,” Kerry said in Bethlehem, in the West Bank, where he met Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
“But I can tell you that President Obama and I are determined, and neither of us will stop in our efforts to pursue the possibility (of peace),” he said.
Earlier at a meeting with Kerry in nearby Jerusalem, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said the negotiations on a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict had failed to make any real progress.
The bleak picture painted by the right-wing leader was similar to the one sketched by senior Palestinians, who have said an Israeli plan announced last week for 3,500 more settler homes in the occupied West Bank was a major obstacle to the success of the negotiations.
But in Bethlehem, Kerry said the United States, Israel’s closest ally, was convinced “that despite the difficulties, both leaders, Abbas and Netanyahu, are also determined to work towards this goal”.
During the meeting with Kerry, Abbas on Wednesday assured the US secretary of state that the peace talks with Israel would continue.
“The Palestinians are committed to negotiations that would lead to the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with east Jerusalem as its capital,” Abbas was quoted by his spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudaineh, as telling Kerry.
Abbas also told Kerry that the Palestinians consider all settlements to be illegitimate, Abu Rudaineh said.
The spokesman’s remarks came in response to Kerry’s statements that Israel should “limit” construction in the settlements as much as possible.
A PA official expressed disappointment that Kerry did not call for an immediate cessation of all settlement construction.
“Talking about limiting the construction does not help the peace talks,” the official told The Jerusalem Post after the meeting. “It’s clear that the Americans have no intention to exert pressure on Israel to stop the construction.”
“That is not to say that they weren’t aware – or we won’t aware – that there would be construction. But that construction, importantly, in our judgment, would be much better off limited as much as possible in an effort to create a climate for these talks to be able to proceed effectively.”
Kerry, whose shuttle diplomacy helped to revive the land-for-peace talks last July after a three-year break, has set a nine-month target window for an agreement, despite widespread skepticism among Israelis and Palestinians.
Few details have emerged from the negotiations, held at unannounced times and at secret locations in line with pledges to keep a lid on leaks.
But Palestinian officials have been airing their frustration over a lack of movement on core issues such as the borders of a Palestinian state, security arrangements, the future of Israeli settlements and the fate of Palestinian refugees.
Abbas, in a speech broadcast on Monday, said that after all the rounds of negotiations “there is nothing on the ground”.
WE, THE USA BETTER BE CAREFUL HOW WE TREAT ISRAEL! WE BETTER GET ON GOD’S SIDE. THE MANDATE OF GOD IN GENESIS 12:3 HAS NOT BEEN RECINDED. IT SAYS:
“I WILL BLESS THEM THAT BLESS THEE, AND CURSE THEM THAT CURSES THEE.” HISTORY SHOWS THIS TO BE TRUE.
WHERE IS GOD, THE GOD OF ABRAHAM, ISSAC AND JACOB IN ALL THIS…JEHOVAH GOD THE ONE WHO CREATED THE WHOLE WORLD AND THIS ONE WHO HOLDS IT TOGETHER AND GIVES US THE BREATH OF LIFE? GOD SAID IN THE SCRIPTURES THAT HE PUT HIS NAME IN JERUSALEM OVER A HUNDRED TIMES, AND THAT DENOTES OWNERSHIP..GOD OWNS JERUSALEM AND HE GAVE IT TO ISRAEL. (GENESIS 15:18 AND JUDGES 2:1) HE SAYS IN ISAIAH 31:5 AS BIRDS FLYING, SO WILL THE LORD OF HOSTS DEFEND JERSALEM, DEFENDING ALSO HE WILL DELIVER IT, AND PASSING OVER HE WILL PRESERVE IT.
GOD TELLS IN EZEKIEL CHAPTER 35 WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO THOSE WHO TRY TO CLAIM THE LAND OF ISRAEL FOR THEMSELVES….THAT DAY IS COMING WHEN GOD WILL IN HIS WRATH DO WHAT HE SAYS HE WILL DO IN THIS PASSAGE.
AS TO THE BOARDERS OF THE LAND OF ISRAEL, GOD TELLS IN THE 47 CHAPTER OF EZEKIEL WHERE THE BOARDERS ARE FOR ISRAEL.
Yes Faye and Dave, spot on. So the building of homes in the so called West bank is illegitimate because America says so. This is what God says.” And I will set thy bounds from the Red sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert unto the river: for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt DRIVE THEM OUT BEFORE THEE. Thou shalt make NO COVENANT WITH THEM, nor with their gods. THEY SHALL NOT DWELL IN THY LAND, lest they make thee sin against me: for if thou serve their gods, it will surely be a snare unto thee”. Exodus 23: 31-33. Can you read Misters Kerry and Obama?
Yes Faye and Dave, spot on. So the building of homes in the so called West bank is illegitimate because America says so. This is what God says.” Exodus 23: 31-33. Can you read Misters Kerry and Obama?