US Middle East Envoy George Mitchell is set to start three days of meetings with Israeli and Palestinian Authority leaders Sunday in an effort to prepare the region for potential peace talks, the US State Department said.
In Ramallah, Mitchell is expected to persuade Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to attend preliminary talks in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meetings, despite Abbas' stance on no talks before a settlement freeze and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent "go ahead" to the construction of nearly 1,000 new settlement homes in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Though Abbas said he would meet with Netanyahu if the Israeli leader had something constructive to say over the settlement issue, plans for the tripartite meeting between US President Barack Obama, Abbas, and Netanyahu, are now on hold, at least according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz on Friday.
It thus appears the Palestinian Authority leader is holding strong to his decision on peace talks, noting after a meeting with French President Nicolas Sarkozy last week that "What the Israeli government said [about the planned construction] is not useful. It is unacceptable for us. We want a freeze on all settlement construction."
The White House also criticized the decision saying, "We regret the reports of Israel's plans to approve additional settlement construction... Continued settlement activity is inconsistent with Israel's commitment under the road map," US officials continue to press Abbas into sitting with Netanyahu, while local analysts say state actors have not gone far enough to pressuring Netanyahu on the settlement issue.
Mitchell will also reportedly work with the Israeli administration on terms for a settlement freeze, though little is expected following Netanyahu's announcement that 455 West Bank and 486 East Jerusalem settlement homes will begin construction in the next months.
According to Israeli media outlet Haaretz, the US Envoy is likely asking for a one-year freeze on all settlement expansion in the West Bank, while Netanyahu will be pushing for a six-month hiatus that does not include projects already okayed by the government, and without including East Jerusalem in the deal. The US said Thursday that it viewed construction on any line past the 1967 boundary, which includes East Jerusalem as a Palestinian area.
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