SHARM EL-SHEIKH: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met the Israeli and Palestinian leaders on Thursday in a bid to a stop a rift over Jewish settlements from derailing fledgling peace talks.
On her first visit to the Middle East since she launched the new talks in Washington on Sept. 2, Clinton held a three-way meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh.
Abbas and Netanyahu shook hands and smiled for the cameras at the start of the meeting but made no remarks.
Earlier the chief US diplomat met separately with the two men and held preparatory talks with President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt who also met both Netanyahu and Abbas.
On her way to Egypt from Washington, Clinton repeated US President Barack Obama’s call on Friday for Israel to extend the 10-month moratorium on settlement construction that is due to expire later this month.
But she did not rule out a deal between the two sides that would result in something short of an extension of the partial freeze on Sept. 30.
"At the same time we recognize that an agreement that could be forged between the Israelis and the Palestinians on actions that would be taken by both sides that would enable the negotiations to continue is in the best interests of both sides," she said.
"This has to be understood as an effort by both the prime minister (Netanyahu) and the president (Abbas) to get over a hurdle posed by the expiration of the original moratorium in order to continue negotiations," she said.
"I think there’s a lot of ways to get to the goal. Remember the goal is to work toward agreement on core issues like borders and territory that would, if agreed upon, eliminate the debate about settlements," Clinton said.
The Palestinians have warned that if the moratorium is not extended, the new peace talks could come to a complete halt.
Egyptian foreign ministry spokesman Hossam Zaki expressed backing for the Palestinian position.
"No one should expect Egypt to convince the Palestinians of what they are not convinced of, they have a clear position on this issue and we support them," he said.
But Zaki played down talk of deadlock in the talks. "It’s too early, let’s see what transpires. It is naive to think that that something concrete would come out of only the second round of talks."
A senior member of Abbas’ Fatah party, Hatem Abdel Qadir, told Egyptian television on Monday that Washington was pressuring the Palestinians to drop their condition of a complete settlement freeze for the talks to continue.
But a member of the negotiating team, Nabil Shaath, said after Clinton met Abbas that the Palestinian leader was not asked to reverse his condition on settlements.
"President Abu Mazen met the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, and our position was clear that the settlements are the main obstacle," he said.
"No one asked us to change our position," he said.
Tuesday’s talks were also expected to tackle the agenda for the negotiations with Netanyahu reportedly wanting to first address future security arrangements and secure Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state.
But the Palestinians want to first define the borders of a future Palestinian state, address the status of Jerusalem and discuss the right of return of refugees who fled or were driven out of what is now Israel in 1948.
Netanyahu’s spokesman Mark Regev said that Israel was seeking to negotiate an agreement quickly but one that would be implemented over a long period.
"The goal is a historic peace agreement within a year," Regev said. "The prime minister has spoken of a framework agreement. It is clear that implementation will be over time.
"We have no illusions about the difficulties," he added.
During the flight over, Clinton said the "time was ripe" for a solution to the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
"If you listen to both leaders, they recognize time is not on either of their sides," she said.
