Vol. 73/No. 45      November 23, 2009

This move comes as Tel Aviv is continuing construction of Jewish settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, with no progress toward negotiating the establishment of a Palestinian state.

Abbas “see no state coming so he really doesn’t think there is a need to be president or to have an Authority,” Saeb Erekat, chief Palestinian negotiator in "peace" talks, told the New York Times. “You think anybody will stay after he leaves?”

The Palestinian Authority was set up in 1994 as an interim governing body for what was to be a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, territories Tel Aviv occupied in 1967. Today the Authority conducts limited civil tasks in the West Bank, which is home to 2.2 million Palestinian Arabs and 280,000 Jewish settlers in 120 settlements. Hamas, a rival bourgeois Palestinian group, runs Gaza.

Palestinian Authority officials have insisted that negotiations with Israel cannot resume without a freeze on settlements. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu counters with a moratorium on some new building, but insists that work will continue on the 3,000 new homes already under construction and says there will be no limit on building in East Jerusalem.

In a visit to Israel October 31, U.S. secretary of state Hillary Clinton praised the Israeli government’s offer as “unprecedented.” Under this plan, Clinton claimed, Tel Aviv “will build no new settlements, expropriate no land, allow no new construction or approvals” for the next nine to 12 months, reported the Washington Post. She rejected the Palestinian Authority’s stance that freezing settlement activity must be a precondition to negotiations.

“Clinton’s comments represented a shift in the dynamics since Obama took office,” noted the Post, "with initial pressure on Israel giving way over the past several weeks to apparent impatience over the refusal of Palestinian officials to resume peace talks in the absence of a settlement freeze.”

Two days later, in Marrakesh, Morocco, Clinton toned down her earlier remarks, saying Tel Aviv’s settlements offer “falls far short” and is “not enough.”

While visiting Jerusalem, Clinton asked Netanyahu “to include in negotiating guidelines specific references to the creation of a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders and in Jerusalem," the New York Times reported. "He declined.”

Netanyahu met with President Barack Obama at the White House November 9, with their discussions shrouded in secrecy. Unlike previous such encounters, noted the Jerusalem Post, this one “was accompanied by an unusual news blackout, as the standard photo op and press availability were not held.”

Earlier that day Netanyahu, in a speech in Washington to the Jewish Federations of North America, backed the resumption of Middle East “peace” talks. He vowed Israel “is willing to make great concessions for peace.” Netanyahu says he backs creating a Palestinian state alongside Israel. But he says there would be no negotiations over East Jerusalem being part of that state and the right of return of Palestinian refugees “wouldn’t be on the table,” noted the Wall Street Journal.  
 
 
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