Committed to dialogue: Abbas
‘Two-state solution to conflict’
RAMALLAH, Palestinian Territories, Dec 1, (Agencies): Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas said he remained committed to dialogue with Israel as he addressed his Fatah party’s first congress since 2009 on Wednesday while facing grim immediate prospects for advancing his goal of a Palestinian state.
The 81-year-old leader was reelected head of Fatah as the congress opened on Tuesday, but speculation has mounted over who will eventually succeed him as Palestinian president.
He has contended with personal unpopularity, with polls showing most Palestinians would like him to resign, and internal party dissent.
Many have lost faith in the socalled peace process spelled out in the Oslo accords of the 1990s that he helped negotiate.
In his speech on Wednesday evening, Abbas said he was committed to negotiating a two-state solution to the conflict, but that it would not come at the expense of Palestinian principles.
“We are saying to the Israeli people that we want peace that conforms to international resolutions, but it is your government who does not,” he said.
Israel must “recognise that settlements are illegal”, he said, adding “our hand will remain extended for peace”.
Peace efforts have been at a standstill since a US-led initiative collapsed in 2014.
The Israelis have called for direct negotiations, while the Palestinians have pursued international support for their cause, saying years of talks have not ended the occupation.
The speech before some 1,400 delegates came with Palestinians facing continued Jewish settlement building in the West Bank and an incoming Donald Trump administration in the United States seen as far more friendly to Israel.
More than 600,000 Israeli settlers now live in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem.
The United States, European Union and others have warned that continued settlement building is eating away at prospects for a two-state solution to the conflict, the basis of years of negotiations.
A controversial Israeli bill to legalise some 4,000 settler homes in the West Bank had been due to come up for a first reading in parliament on Wednesday, but it was delayed until Monday as behind-the-scenes debate continued.
The international community considers all Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Israeli-annexed east
Jerusalem to be illegal, whether they are authorised by the government or not.
The Israeli government differentiates between those it has approved and those it has not.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s current coalition is considered the most right-wing in Israel’s history.
Meanwhile, the Palestinian president on Wednesday expressed hope that President-elect Donald Trump will support the Palestinian quest for independence, saying little is known about the incoming American leader’s policies.
In a sprawling speech that lasted well over three hours to his Fatah Party, President Mahmoud Abbas said he hopes that 2017 will be the year that the Palestinians finally gain independence and that he would seek Trump’s help in achieving that goal.
“We know nothing about him,” Abbas said. “His people elected him. We didn’t, and if he wants to talk with us, we are pursuing that.”
Trump has said he would like to broker a Mideast peace deal, but he has given few details on how he hopes to
do so. He has raised concerns among Palestinians because many of his advisers take hard-line positions that favor Israel, and his campaign platform made no mention of Palestinian independence — a US position for the past two decades.
“We hope that he will be able to offer something to the Palestinian cause, to offer a solution, a sane, balanced and fair (solution),” Abbas said.
In related news, a leading minister called Mahmud Abbas Israel’s top ideological enemy on Thursday after the Palestinian president suggested he could withdraw recognition if progress was not made towards peace.
Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz, seen as close to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, called the Palestinian leader’s remarks at a Fatah party congress in Ramallah on Wednesday “a sad joke.”
“Abu Mazen talks about stopping recognising Israel — he never really recognised Israel’s right to exist and the Jewish people’s right to a state of their own,” Steinitz told army radio, referring to Abbas.