US to Israel: Settlement freeze not a precondition for peace talks

Sunday November 01, 2009 11:03 by Saed Bannoura - IMEMC News

Israeli settlement expansion (photo from UPI)

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced on Saturday during a press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu that the US government will no longer press the Israelis to freeze settlement construction as a precondition for peace talks with the Palestinians -- but she insisted that this was not a policy change on the part of the US government.

Clinton showered praise on the Israeli Prime Minister during their joint press conference, saying "I think where we are right now is to try to get into negotiations. The prime minister will be able to present his government's proposal about what they are doing regarding settlements, which I think when fully explained will be seen as being not only unprecedented, but in response to many of the concerns that have been expressed."

The press conference comes at a time of unprecedented and accelerated settlement expansion. The Israeli government has confirmed a rapid increase in construction on at least 11 settlements, although Palestinians say that they have witnessed increased construction on many more. In the past, such expansion has been used to establish 'facts on the ground' in advance of peace talks, in order to entrench the land grabs and make them more difficult to remove.

Previously the US government under the Obama administration had called for a settlement freeze, but that call has slowly eroded over the last several months after pressure from the Israeli government and its supporters in the US.

Approximately 300,000 Israeli settlers live on settlements, or colonies, on illegally seized Palestinian land in the West Bank, while another 250,000 live on illegally seized Palestinian land in East Jerusalem. All of these settlements have been condemned by the United Nations as violations of international law and the Fourth Geneva Convention, as they involve the transfer of civilian populations onto land seized from the indigenous Palestinian population by military force.

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