Israel and the Palestinians will resume direct peace talks in early September, striving for a deal within a year to create an independent Palestinian state, US officials announced today.
President Barack Obama will host Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, as well as Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Jordan's King Abdullah II, said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Backed by a diplomatic quartet of world powers, the parties will ‘relaunch direct negotiations to resolve all final status issues, which we believe can be completed within one year,’ she announced at the US State Department.
Mr Mubarak and the king will attend ‘in view of their critical role in this effort,’ said the top US diplomat, who underlined: ‘Their continued leadership and commitment to peace will be essential to our success.’
Mrs Clinton said she and Mr Obama, who has pushed hard for resuming talks that lapsed in December 2008, as well as Mr Netanyahu and Mr Abbas shared ‘the goal of two states, Israel and Palestine, living side by side in peace and security.’
She said the new round of negotiations ‘should take place without preconditions and be characterised by good faith and a commitment to their success, which will bring a better future to all of the people of the region.’
Mr Obama will hold bilateral talks with the four leaders, followed by a group dinner, on 1 September, Mrs Clinton said, adding that the Quartet representative, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair was invited to the meal.
Mrs Clinton said she had invited Mr Netanyahu and Mr Abbas to the US State Department the following day for a trilateral meeting to relaunch direct negotiations, and called for all sides to take steps ‘to advance our effort, not hinder it.’
‘There have been difficulties in the past. There will be difficulties ahead. Without a doubt, we will hit more obstacles. The enemies of peace will keep trying to defeat us and derail these talks,’ said Mrs Clinton.
‘But I ask the parties to persevere, to keep moving forward even through difficult times, and to continue working to achieve a just and lasting peace in the region,’ she said, reading from a prepared statement.
Mr Netanyahu has welcomed the US invitation.
'The prime minister has been calling for direct negotiations for the past year and a half,' a statement from Mr Netanyahu's office said.
'He was pleased with the American clarification that the talks would be without preconditions.'
Mr Netanyahu had earlier rejected Palestinian calls for the talks to be conditional on extending a temporary freeze on Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank.
Palestinian leaders also welcomed the invitation.
A statement issued in New York in the name of the US, EU, Russia and the UN said it 'contains the elements needed to provide for a peace agreement,' Saeb Erekat, the Palestinians' chief negotiator, told Reuters.
Hamas meanwhile dismissed Washington's call.
Read the full statement from the Middle East Quartet
