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Israel talks to begin today

Israeli and Palestinian negotiators prepared yesterday to begin discussing the most contentious issues in their 100-year conflict as part of efforts backed by US President George W. Bush to iron out a final peace agreement by the end of this year.

Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and chief Palestinian negotiator Ahmed Qureia were scheduled to meet at a Jerusalem hotel at 11am, Israeli officials said on condition of anonymity.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Sunday that the negotiators would tackle the core issues: Jerusalem, Israeli West Bank settlements, Palestinian refugees, borders, security and water resources.

"If we reach an agreement on all these issues, then we can say that we have reached a final agreement," Abbas said.

Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev confirmed that the negotiating teams were to meet yesterday and that they had received a mandate to begin discussions on the core issues.

Abbas and his Israeli counterpart, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert agreed to restart peace talks, frozen during seven years of violence, at a US-sponsored Middle East peace conference in November.

Last week, before Bush's arrival, they told their negotiating teams to get down to discussing the core issues. Previous negotiations have broken down over these topics, as so far neither side has been willing to compromise enough to satisfy the other.

Olmert and Abbas pledged to make efforts to reach a peace accord this year, before Bush leaves office.

However, since November, talks have concentrated only on Israeli settlement construction and Palestinian violence.

In his speech on Sunday, Abbas said: "We told President Bush that we can't move ahead in negotiations while settlement activities are going on. We can't have negotiations while they are building houses all over."

On Sunday, Olmert said the fact that unauthorized settlement outposts were still there, four years after Israel pledged to remove them, was a "disgrace."

Olmert was speaking at a closed meeting of party backers. His comment followed a public rebuke by Bush during his visit last week.

Standing next to Olmert, Bush said: "Look, I mean, we've been talking about it for four years. The agreement was, `Get rid of outposts, illegal outposts,' and they ought to go."

About 400 Israelis live in outposts, the anti-settlement Peace Now movement said, in addition to about 270,000 who live in more than 120 settlements authorized by Jerusalem.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, whose office oversees settlement activity, has reached an agreement with settlers that they will dismantle on their own 18 of the 26 outposts that Israel must evacuate according to an agreement with the US and the Palestinians, the Haaretz newspaper reported yesterday.

According to the deal reached after months of negotiations, settlers living in the outposts will move to existing settlements, the daily said.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said he hoped Olmert would follow through on the outposts.
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