Washington’s response to plans to advance the building of 1,100 housing units in the Jewish east Jerusalem neighborhood of Gilo was relatively subdued. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called the Gilo project “counterproductive to our efforts to resume direct negotiations between the parties.”
Statements coming from Berlin were worded more sternly.
Following a phone call between Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Chancellor Angela Merkel about the Gilo project, the German Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying that Merkel told Netanyahu that she “lacked any comprehension for the approval of new construction plans for Gilo near Jerusalem just days after the Quartet declaration [calling for a new peace plan] had been passed.”
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