Reported:
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has declined a US request to freeze a project to build dozens of housing units in an east Jerusalem settlement, army radio reported on Tuesday.
US Middle East envoy George Mitchell had recently asked the hawkish premier to halt the project in Gilo, saying it risks raising tensions with Palestinians amid floundering efforts by Washington to restart peace negotiations, it said.
But Netanyahu refused, saying that the project did not require government approval and that Gilo was "an integral part of Jerusalem," it said...
No comment was immediately available from the US side.
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1 comment:
For once I agree with you on this point. I am starting to think that Obama really was quite unwise to start his attempt at Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking with a demand for a settlement freeze (this is despite the fact that I'm usually opposed to any further building in settlements). It doesn't seem to have gotten him anywhere in his attempts to have Abbas & Netanyahu sit down and talk to each other, and seems only to have had the effect of making the Palestinians even more unwilling to talk to the Israelis.
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