Global Arab Network | Saudi refuses peace with Israel without withdrawal

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Saudi refuses peace with Israel without withdrawal

Global Arab Network - - Adam Turner

Wednesday, 29 July 2009 21:24

Saudi Arabia rejected US calls for diplomatic proposal toward Israel and said Israel's settlement expansion is sabotaging efforts to revive peace talks.

"It is Israel that has to move seriously towards the peace process," Saudi foreign ministry spokesman Osama Nugali said.

"As we all know, Israel is continuing to take unilateral measures by changing the geographic and demographic facts on the ground, by building settlements and expanding the existing ones," he told AFP.

Nugali said Israeli settlement expansion on occupied Arab land continues to impede any progress toward a lasting two-state solution between the Palestinians and Israelis.

"We have been seeing a schizophrenic Israeli policy. On one hand you talk about peace and their interest to achieve peace," he said. "On the other hand they take actions against the peace process that complicate it and put it in jeopardy."

His comments came amid a concerted US push towards restarting comprehensive Middle East peace negotiations involving Israel and its neighbours Syria, Lebanon and the Palestinians.

US Middle East peace envoy George Mitchell, Defence Secretary Robert Gates and US National Security Advisor James Jones have been meeting leaders in the region this week.

Israel has rejected calls by the US administration to halt settlement activity, leading to the worst public rift between the two close allies in years.

And the Palestinians have refused to restart negotiations until Israel freezes construction in the West Bank, where around 300,000 settlers now live.

In addition, in Washington several legislators have drafted a letter to Saudi King Abdullah calling on him to make a "dramatic gesture" towards Israel similar to ground-breaking overtures that paved the wave for peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan.

But the Saudis maintain that those overtures have not brought progress toward creating a Palestinian state.

Since early this year Riyadh has been urging a new international effort based on its 2002 Arab peace initiative, which offers Israel full diplomatic recognition from all Arab states in exchange for the creation of a Palestinian state with a shared Jerusalem as its capital.

"The Arab peace initiative is very clear," Nugali said.

"That Israel should withdraw from the Arab lands and put an end to its occupation and resolve the major issues of the conflict," he said, citing the future of Palestinian refugees, water-sharing issues, and Jerusalem's future status.

Such issues must be resolved "in order to achieve a permanent, just and lasting peace which is based on the establishment of an independent contiguous and viable Palestinian state," Nugali said.

"In the Arab peace process normalisation comes after achieving these goals, not before it. So we should not put the cart before the horse."

"It is not possible to take (normalisation) steps while the settlements are still being built," he said. (AFP)

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