US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton announced yesterday that Israel and the Palestinians would return to direct negotiations for the first time in 20 months, delivering US President Barak Obama’s administration a small victory in its protracted effort to revive the Middle East peace process.
Clinton said she and Obama invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to Washington to meet face-to-face to formally open a fresh round of talks aimed at creating a Palestinian state and lasting peace in the region.
The purpose is to “resolve all final-status issues, which we believe can be completed in one year,” Clinton said. “These negotiations should take place without preconditions.”
Netanyahu and Abbas have agreed to place a one-year time limit on the talks, sources close to the talks said before Clinton’s announcement.
“The Palestinians and Israelis are expected to accept that invitation,” the sources said.
The talks would cover thorny “final status” issues such as the borders of a new Palestinian state, the political status of Jerusalem and right of return for Palestinian refugees, as well as security guarantees for Israel.
Clinton has been working the telephone in recent days to clear the final hurdles, speaking on Thursday with Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh and with former British prime minister Tony Blair, the special representative of the Quartet of Middle East peacemakers — the US, the UN, the EU and Russia.
The Quartet issued a statement in the UN as Clinton was making her announcement, expressing its support for the parties throughout the negotiations and “the implementation of an agreement.”
“The Quartet again calls on both sides to observe calm and restraint, and to refrain from provocative actions and inflammatory rhetoric,” the statement said.
The one-year time limit is viewed as crucial because the Palestinians are leery of being drawn into an open-ended negotiation with Israel.
The official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported that on Thursday night that Abbas had called a meeting of the Fatah Central Committee, at which “developments in the peace process” were discussed.
Netanyahu has long said he is open to talks, but the Palestinians have been resistant, seeking assurances from the US about the terms and conditions.
Israel has eschewed any conditions to negotiations, officials said, including an extension of the government’s 10-month, partial moratorium on settlement construction in the West Bank, set to expire on Sept. 26.
The US has pushed to restart direct talks so that the two sides would be at the negotiating table when that date arrives. Obama held separate meetings with Netanyahu and Abbas in recent weeks, which officials said helped reassure the Palestinians and began to heal a rift with Israel over Washington’s demands that Israel halt settlement construction.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY AFP AND REUTERS
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