Abbas, Netanyahu relaunch peace talks

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speaks as Israeli PM Netanyahu (L) and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (R) look on, during the re-launch of direct negotiations between Israel and Palestinian Authority

Israeli and Palestinian leaders launched their first direct talks in 20 months yesterday, starting the clock on a daunting one-year deadline to flesh out a Palestinian state to live in peace with Israel.
After a day of weighty symbolism and lofty rhetoric at the White House, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sat down yesterday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.
“I want to thank all of you for joining us today to relaunch negotiations,” Clinton, who is hosting the talks, told the two leaders, praising them for their “courage and commitment.”
“The decision to sit at this table was not easy. We understand the suspicion and skepticism that so many feel born out of years of conflict and frustrated hopes,” Clinton said.
In an ornate room at the State Department, the leaders were to tackle core issues that have bedeviled decades of peace attempts – Israel’s security, the borders of a Palestinian state, the right of return for Palestinian refugees and the fate of Jerusalem, claimed by both as their capital.
Host Clinton, Middle East envoy George Mitchell and other US officials were to work with Netanyahu, Abbas and their teams during an intense three hours of brass-tacks negotiations.
Analysts expect the two sides to first tackle the less difficult issues of security and borders and skirt the thorny problems of refugees and Jerusalem, which cut to the heart of their identities as peoples living next to each other.
Mitchell, a former troubleshooter in Northern Ireland who has a reputation as a dogged mediator, has said he is prepared to intervene with “bridging proposals” if needed and appropriate.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who was at the White House to help mediate the talks, urged US President Barack Obama to throw the full weight of the United States behind the talks, Mubarak’s spokesman Soliman Awaad said.
“What is really needed is for the United States to step in, remain committed, remain engaged and lend a helping hand to the two parties in order to help bridge the gaps in the positions, sort the differences,” he said.
Abbas had previously refused to enter direct negotiations without a full halt to Israeli settlement activity, but yielded under pressure from Obama.
But Abbas has warned that a renewal of settlement activities after September 26, when a 10-month partial moratorium expires, would end the negotiations. The settlements house about 500,000 people on lands occupied by Israel in 1967.
Netanyahu faces pressure from his Likud party to continue settlement construction.
The Palestinians want to build a state in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, which is currently run by the militant Islamist Hamas movement, with east Jerusalem as its capital. Israel claims all of Jerusalem as its undivided capital.