WORLD> Middle East
|
WORLD> Middle East
|
|
Palestinians reject 'demilitarized state'
(China Daily)
Updated: 2009-06-16 08:30 RAMALLAH, West Bank: World powers should isolate Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after he unveiled tough terms for a Middle East peace accord, an aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said Monday.
But Palestinians were dismayed by Netanyahu's demand they first recognize Israel as a Jewish state and his failure to halt Jewish settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank. "The international community should confront this policy, through which Netanyahu wants to kill off any chance for peace," Abbas adviser Yasser Abed Rabbo said. "They must isolate and confront this policy which Netanyahu is adopting and exert pressure on him so that he adheres to international legitimacy and the roadmap," he said, referring to a US-sponsored 2003 peace plan. Interviewed on US television Monday, Netanyahu said he hoped to narrow differences with US President Barack Obama over settlements.
"President Obama and I are trying to reach a common understanding on this," Netanyahu said on NBC's Today Show. "I think we'll find some common ground." The White House called Sunday's address "an important step forward" for implementing Obama's peace vision. The European Union described the speech as "a step in the right direction" but said it was not enough to raise EU-Israel ties to a higher level. Divisive issues Netanyahu pledged to keep all of Jerusalem as Israel's capital - defying Palestinians' claim on the city - and hedged on whether Israel would ever remove West Bank settlements. He ruled out the admission of Palestinian refugees to Israel proper and said Abbas must impose his authority over the breakaway Hamas Islamists ruling the Gaza Strip. Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said mediators should challenge Netanyahu on whether he was prepared to tackle territorial issues such as borders, Jerusalem and settlements. "Netanyahu is talking about negotiations about cantons - the canton of the state of Palestine, with a flag and an anthem, a state without borders, without sovereignty, without a capital," Erekat said. Netanyahu's Cabinet secretary, Zvi Hauser, described the speech as an opening move in what Israel hoped would be discussions of a peace deal involving the wider Arab world. Netanyahu's speech met circumspection across the political spectrum in Israel, which has seen almost two decades of stop-start talks about a "two-state solution", a concept the right-wing Likud party chief had long balked at endorsing. Top figures in Netanyahu's hawkish government lined up behind him Monday, despite the historically hard line they have taken on territorial concessions. The hard-liners appeared buoyed by the nationalistic tone of Netanyahu's speech and tough conditions he attached after caving to US pressure to endorse a Palestinian state. Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, the most powerful hard-liner in Netanyahu's government, said the prime minister's speech outlined "the balance between our aspirations for peace and the aspiration for security." "Netanyahu opened the door to the Palestinians and the Arab nations to begin peace talks, and we hope the other side will take up the offer to renew negotiations," Lieberman said after the speech. Eli Yishai, head of the ultra-Orthodox Jewish Shas party, said Netanyahu "stressed his commitment to plausible peace and security." Shas, Lieberman's Yisrael Beiteinu and the centrist Labor Party are Netanyahu's main coalition allies. Labor has long endorsed the concept of a Palestinian state. Blair visits Gaza Visiting Mideast envoy Tony Blair Monday called on Islamic Hamas movement to change its policy and called for isolating extremists to rebuild the Gaza Strip. "It would help if there was a change of policy also in the point of view of Hamas," Blair told a news conference in Gaza city. "We need a change of policy that helps the people here and isolates the extremists," he said. Blair added that such a policy would allow goods and materials to enter the Israeli-blockaded territory and "help the rebuilding of Gaza and the legitimate economy to thrive" rather than using the underground tunnels between Gaza and Egypt to bring in goods. Meanwhile, Blair stressed that negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians must lead to building a Palestinian state from the bottom up. The former British prime minister visited Gaza briefly and met with UN officials and Palestinian private sector representatives at the headquarter of the UN Relief and Works Agency. He did not meet any Hamas officials, the Islamic movement which controls the Gaza Strip since 2007. Reuters - Xinhua |
||||||
