'PA won't allow E1 settlement project to happen'

PA president says Palestinians are "holding contacts on all levels to stop Israeli project that aims to sabotage the peace process.”

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
Abbas 521 (photo credit: Marc Israël Sellem )
Abbas 521
(photo credit: Marc Israël Sellem )
The Palestinian Authority will not allow Israeli plans to build in the E1 area of Jerusalem to be realized, PA President Mahmoud Abbas said Saturday, according to Palestinian news agency Wafa.
Abbas said the building plans are “a red line and we will not allow it to happen.”
Speaking at the opening session of the Fatah Advisory Council on “statehood and international legitimacy,” the PA president said “we are holding contacts on all levels to stop this Israeli project that aims to sabotage the peace process,” as quoted by Wafa.
Abbas’s comments come a day after Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu vowed to ignore the international community’s condemnation of prospective building plans for Jerusalem across the Green Line, in an interview aired in part on Channel 2.
“The entire world oppose settlements and say they are illegal,” Wafa quoted Abbas as saying.
“International resolutions say settlements are an obstacle to peace and therefore they should be stopped in total in all the Palestinian territories, particularly in occupied Jerusalem, in order to resume serious and real negotiations on all final status issues to reach a comprehensive and just peace.”
He added that Palestinian leaders were exploring a range of measures to respond to Israeli moves, and called on the international community to press Israel to release tax revenues belonging to the PA.