The Palestinian Authority on Tuesday strongly condemned Israeli plans to build
new homes in Jerusalem and called on the international community to respond by
recognizing a Palestinian state on the territories captured by Israel in
1967.
PA officials said the construction plans showed that the Israeli
government preferred building in the settlements to resuming peace talks with
the Palestinians.
“The international community must respond to Israel’s
unilateral measures by instantly recognizing a Palestinian state on the 1967
borders,” said chief PLO negotiator Saeb Erekat. “While the Palestinians and the
rest of the world were expecting [Prime Minister] Binyamin Netanyahu to announce
a full cessation of settlement construction, he’s now sending to us and the US
Administration a different message to the effect that Israel has chosen
settlements and rejected peace.”
Erekat said that Israel’s “illegal
practices,” which include settlement construction, bypass highways, the security
fence and restricted movement for Palestinians, are aimed at preventing the
establishment of an independent Palestinian state. The time has come, he added,
for “difficult decisions because the Palestinians could no longer remain idle in
the face of Israel’s practices that consolidate the occupation on our
land.”
Erekat urged the international community to intervene immediately
to salvage the two-state solution, achieve lasting peace and recognize a
Palestinian state along the 1967 borders, with east Jerusalem as its capital “as
a natural response to the measures of Israel, which considers itself to be above
the law.”
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas also condemned
the Israeli plan to build new homes in Jerusalem and said peace and settlements
can’t go together.
Abbas told members of a Chinese delegation visiting
Ramallah that halting settlement construction was not a Palestinian condition,
but an “international demand.” He also told them that the Palestinians had
fulfilled all their obligations under international agreements and the road map
for peace, while Israel hadn’t fulfilled even one.
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