US President Barack Obama has called for direct talks between Israelis and Palestinians for lasting peace in the region and said that Jewish settlements were an obstacle to achieving that.
He was speaking in Ramallah after meeting Palestinian officials on the second day of his Mideast tour to emphasise the importance of reaching an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal.
Obama headed to the West Bank on Thursday to tell the Palestinians that the creation of a Palestinian state remains a priority for his administration.
Obama said Palestinians deserved an independent and sovereign state and an end to occupation by Israel. The US president said that Palestinians should not have to confront the daily indignities that come with occupation.
The US president did not bring a new plan to relaunch peace talks, but said both sides should end unilateral actions that halt moves to resolve the conflict.
Those troublesome actions include continued construction of Jewish housing settlements on land claimed by the Palestinians and repeated Palestinian efforts to achieve recognition at the United Nations in the absence of a peace agreement.
Yasser Abed-Rabbo, an aide of Abbas, said before the meeting that the Palestinians will tell Obama they won’t return to negotiations with Israel without a settlement freeze.
“There can be no real (peace) process with the continuation of settlement activities on our lands,” he said, adding that the issue of settlements is central to the Obama-Abbas meeting.
Palestinians argue that they cannot negotiate a border between Israel and a future Palestine while Israel unilaterally shapes that line through accelerated settlement building.
The Palestinians want a state in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem territories Israel captured in the 1967 war – but are ready for minor adjustments to accommodate some settlements closest to Israel.
Since 1967, Israel has built dozens of settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem that are now home to 560,000 Israelis – an increase of 60,000 since Obama became president four years ago.
Palestinians argue that only strong U.S. pressure can get Israel to change course and halt its settlement enterprise, but doubt Obama is willing to do so. Obama’s wooing of Israeli public opinion during his current trip has further enforced such perceptions.
In downtown Ramallah, several dozen people protested against what is perceived here as a strong US bias in favor of Israel.
Obama “should take immediate action to stop settlement activity because the passivity of his position toward settlements is happening while the very last option of a two-state solution is being killed by Israeli settlements,” said Mustafa Barghouti, a leading Palestinian activist.
That calm has not extended to Gaza, which is run by the militant Islamic Hamas movement.
As Obama began his program Thursday, Israeli police said fighters in Gaza had fired two rockets at the southern town of Sderot.
One of the rockets exploded in the courtyard of a house in Sderot early in the morning, causing damage but no injuries, said police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld.
The other landed in an open field. Sirens wailed in Sderot shortly after the 7 am. rocket attack, forcing residents on their way to work or school to run to bomb shelters.
In contrast to Israel, the Palestinians have shown little excitement over the Obama visit. In the run-up to the visit, demonstrators have defaced and destroyed posters of Obama in an expression of dissatisfaction with US policy in the region.