Thursday’s talks, in a Jerusalem hotel, were “very difficult,” the source said. “The gap… is still wide.”
Officials in Jerusalem said Friday that no progress had been made in peace talks that took place between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators the night before, and that the two sides would meet again next week after the Passover holiday.
State Department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki said this week that Israeli and Palestinian negotiators are striving to reach an agreement to extend their peace talks beyond the April 29 deadline.
Het is trekken aan een dood paard, en de kans dat er bij nieuwe onderhandelingen wel serieus vooruitgang wordt geboekt en beide partijen bereid zijn tot serieuze concessies lijkt nihil. Er is een reden (of meerdere) dat de onderhandelingen steeds vastlopen. Wanneer het medicijn niet werkt, moet je misschien een ander proberen, of de patiënt even met rust laten, en vooral ook onderzoeken welke behandeling misschien effectiever zou kunnen zijn. De hulp van een andere dokter inroepen kan ook helpen.
The Palestinians want a state based on the lines that existed before Israel occupied the West Bank and Gaza in the 1967 Six-Day War.
Voor 1967 wilden de Palestijnen een staat in Israel, niet op de Westbank, dat toen in handen was van Jordanië. ‘The lines that existed’ waren tijdelijke wapenstilstandslijnen, die niet werden erkend als grens. Israel had meermaals voorgesteld om te onderhandelen en (een deel van) de bezette gebieden terug te geven in ruil voor vrede, maar dat wilden de Arabische staten niet. Na 1967 veranderde de PLO langzaam haar positie, van een staat in het hele gebied naar een staat op de Westoever en in Gaza, waarbij het onduidelijk blijft in hoeverre men als onderdeel van een vredesverdrag een Joodse staat Israel zal accepteren binnen de 1949 wapenstilstandslijnen. Uit enquetes blijkt steevast dat een meerderheid van de Palestijnen daar tegen is. Ook Fatah en PA functionarissen spreken zich geregeld uit tegen twee staten voor twee volken, en houden alle opties voor de toekomst open.
RP
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Israelis, Palestinians to hold separate talks with US envoy
http://www.timesofisrael.com/israelis-palestinians-hold-separate-talks-with-us-envoy/
Indyk meets with Erekat in Jericho; Netanyahu reportedly refuses to free, deport Israeli Arab prisoners
TIMES OF ISRAEL STAFF April 18, 2014
Israeli and Palestinian negotiators were to meet separately Friday with US peace envoy Martin Indyk, a Palestinian source said, a day after five hours of three-way talks failed to bring agreement.
Indyk was due to hold talks with chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat in the West Bank city of Jericho from 08:00 GMT, the source said, but he had no details of the US-Israeli meeting and Israeli officials did not respond to requests for information.
Thursday’s talks, in a Jerusalem hotel, were “very difficult,” the source said. “The gap… is still wide.”
Officials in Jerusalem said Friday that no progress had been made in peace talks that took place between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators the night before, and that the two sides would meet again next week after the Passover holiday.
State Department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki said this week that Israeli and Palestinian negotiators are striving to reach an agreement to extend their peace talks beyond the April 29 deadline.
But commentator Nahum Barnea, writing in the Yedioth Ahronoth daily on Friday, likened the almost nine months of talks, into which Secretary of State John Kerry coaxed the sides, to prolonged “mutual torture.
“Kerry keeps them going like a gambler in a casino, who insists on putting his money on the roulette wheel, in the hope that the wheel will stop on his number at some point,” Barnea wrote.
“He believed that he would reach a peace agreement; then he limited himself to a framework agreement; he later limited himself even further to an American proposal for a framework; and then just to ideas.
“In the end, the entire prestige of the United States is invested in a marginal, questionable deal, which will only prolong the mutual torture.”
Washington is pushing for an extension, but the negotiations hit an impasse two weeks ago when Israel refused to release a group of Palestinian prisoners as agreed at last year’s launch of the talks.
Under the agreement, Israel had committed to freeing 104 prisoners held since before the 1993 Oslo autonomy accords in four batches, but it cancelled the release of the last group of 26.
Among them are 14 Israeli Arabs who the Jewish state is refusing to set free.
According to Israel Radio, the Palestinians are adamant in their demand that all 26 prisoners be released, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has refused to concede on the issue of releasing the Israeli Arab terrorists. The head of the Shin Bet security service advised Netanyahu to release the 14 Israeli Arab prisoners in question and deport them to the Gaza Strip or abroad, the report said, but Netanyahu said he would not act in a way that may endanger Israeli citizens.
The Palestinians retaliated by seeking accession to several international treaties.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas told Israeli opposition MPs visiting him in the West Bank city of Ramallah on Wednesday that if talks were extended, he would want the first three months “devoted to a serious discussion of borders,” Haaretz newspaper reported.
The Palestinians want a state based on the lines that existed before Israel occupied the West Bank and Gaza in the 1967 Six-Day War.
Read more: Israelis, Palestinians to hold separate talks with US envoy | The Times of Israel http://www.timesofisrael.com/israelis-palestinians-hold-separate-talks-with-us-envoy/#ixzz2zGGUvanA
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