MANAMA: Bahrain’s King Hamad and President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt on Thursday discussed efforts to restart stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, a senior Bahraini official said.
Mubarak briefed the king on "the latest contacts between the Palestinian Authority and the United States," the official told AFP, adding "Israeli obstacles to a resumption of the negotiations are unacceptable."
The Palestinians insist that for direct peace talks that started on Sept. 2, only to stumble to a halt three weeks later, Israel must cease all Jewish settlement activity in occupied territory.
The September negotiations ended at the same time as a 10-month moratorium on settlement building in the West Bank.
Israel is currently mulling plans for a fresh 90-day ban on West Bank settlement building in return for a generous US package of political and military benefits.
The one-off freeze would halt new building in the West Bank but not in annexed east Jerusalem, which the Palestinians want as the capital of a future state.
Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas on Sunday said he would not return to the negotiating table unless the freeze included east Jerusalem.
Mubarak said Gulf countries agreed with Cairo that the peace talks must resume, but "in a manner that safeguards Palestinian rights," the official said.
The Egyptian president was in Bahrain on the final stage of a Gulf tour that also took him to the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.
