“The US does not accept the legitimacy of continued settlement activity and opposes any efforts to legitimise settlement outpost”
Agencies/Washington
Israeli and Palestinian negotiators will resume peace talk in Jerusalem on August 14, the US State Department said yesterday.
“Negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians will be resuming on August 14 in Jerusalem and will be followed by a meeting in Jericho (in the West Bank),” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki told a briefing.
The sides held their first peace negotiations in nearly three years in Washington on July 30 in US-mediated efforts to end the conflict of more than six decades.
Psaki said US envoys Martin Indyk and Frank Lowenstein will travel to the region to help facilitate the negotiations.
She added that US Secretary of State John Kerry, who hosted July’s resumption of the talks “does not expect to make any announcement in the aftermath of this round of talks.”
The announcement came as Israel said it had given preliminary approval for the construction of more than 800 new homes in Jewish settlements on occupied West Bank land, a move that would complicate peace negotiations.
Psaki said Washington had taken up the issue with the Israelis.
“The US does not accept the legitimacy of continued settlement activity and opposes any efforts to legitimise settlement outpost,” Psaki said.
“The Secretary has made clear that he believes both the negotiating teams are at the table in good faith and are committed to making progress,” she added.
Kerry has said the sides have given themselves about nine months to try to reach an agreement.
The US is seeking to broker an agreement on a two-state solution, in which Israel would exist peacefully alongside a new Palestinian state created in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, lands partly occupied by Israel since a 1967 war.
The latest direct talks collapsed in late 2010 over Israel’s building of Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
In Ramallah, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said peace negotiations will begin soon.
Speaking to the press after Eid al-Fitr prayers, Abbas said that Palestinians will be going to the talks with the intention of sticking to their right for an independent state with Jerusalem as its capital.
He also said the Palestinians wanted Israel to release their countrymen from Israeli prisons.
The Palestinian leader also insisted that national reconciliation among Palestinians was amongst his priorities, adding that the Palestine Liberation Organisation was ready to implement agreements reached at previous meetings in Cairo and Doha.
l The airport in Israel’s Red Sea resort of Eilat resumed flights yesterday after a brief shutdown over unspecified security concerns, the military said.
“The airport is open after a new situation report,” a spokeswoman said, without further explanation.
The military earlier ordered the cancellation of all flights in and out of Eilat for about two hours following a security assessment, but gave no details of the possible threat.
Only domestic flights had been scheduled to land or take off from the southern town.
News website Ynet said the shutdown did not appear to be linked to fears of an imminent Al Qaeda operation, which prompted the US to close its Middle East diplomatic missions.
Eilat has been the target of attacks in the past.
