No official Palestinian response on settlements before Oct 4

Abbas to consult Arab govts before deciding whether to continue talks with Israel following end of settlement freeze.

JERUSALEM:

Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas will consult Arab governments next week before deciding whether to continue talks with Israel following the end of the settlement freeze, his spokesman said Monday.

"Before October 4 there will not be an official Palestinian answer," spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeina told AFP in Paris, where Abbas was due to hold talks with French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

"During that day president Abbas will consult with the Arab governments and will come back to the Palestinian leadership to take the right decision and the right answer, with all what we have from the Americans and the Israelis."

Abbas had previously warned that Palestinian negotiators will break off peace talks with Israel if Jewish settlers resume settlement building in the occupied West Bank.

A moratorium on settlement building expired at midnight on Sunday and, while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called for settlers to show "restraint", Israel has not ordered a new freeze.

"We are in continuous contact with the US administration and US efforts are continuing, but we are waiting for a final Israeli position so that we can form a clear and final response," Abu Rudeina said.

"Any Palestinian decision concerning any political decision will not be before October 4, the day of the meeting of the Arab follow-up committee," he said, referring to a panel comprising key Arab powers. "During that day the Palestinian leadership and the Arab follow-up committee will meet in Cairo in order to discuss the latest developments.

"Concerning what was said yesterday in Israel our position is clear and obvious. We are ready for serious negotiations, but the settlement activity should stop immediately. This is the only way to continue fruitful talks."

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fended off intense international pressure, allowing a settlement freeze to expire at midnight, but urged Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas not to abandon peace talks in protest.

"I call on president Abbas to continue with the good and honest talks we have just embarked upon, in an attempt to reach a historic peace agreement between our two peoples," Netanyahu said in a statement early Monday, minutes after allowing the 10-month partial moratorium on settlement construction to lapse. Abbas, for his part, urged Netanyahu to re-impose the building ban.

President Abbas "wants to continue the negotiations but Netanyahu must take a decision to freeze the settlements in order to create an appropriate atmosphere to proceed with the peace talks," Abbas' spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeina told AFP in Paris.

The United States also renewed its call that Israel keep a freeze on the construction of new settlements, saying that its position on the issue remains unchanged. "We remain in close touch with both parties and will be meeting with them again in the coming days," said State Department spokesman PJ Crowley. "We remain focused on the goal of advancing negotiations toward a two-state solution and encourage the parties to take constructive actions toward that goal."

The Palestinian leader has repeatedly warned he would walk out of peace talks that were relaunched at the beginning of the month if Israel resumes building in the occupied West Bank. But he appeared to step back from the brink on Sunday, saying he would meet top Arab diplomats on October 4 before deciding his next move. The statement from Netanyahu did not directly mention the settlement freeze, but acknowledged a flurry of diplomatic activity aimed at saving the fledgling peace process.

"During the day and in recent days Prime Minister Netanyahu held intensive contacts with US Secretary of State (Hillary) Clinton and other American officials," the statement said, adding that he had also spoken with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and King Abdullah II of Jordan.

In Washington, Crowley said Clinton spoke with Netanyahu and Tony Blair, the representative of the quartet of foreign entities actively engaged in the talks. The United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations make up the quartet. At the same time Mideast peace envoy Senator George Mitchell and Assistant Secretary Jeff Feltman conferred in New York on Sunday with Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat. "We keep pushing for the talks to continue," Crowley said in a statement.

Much depends on how Abbas will react. A wide-scale resumption of settlement construction would almost certainly force Abbas to quit talks, but Israel is hoping that he would tolerate low-key construction. Netanyahu urged settlers to display "restraint and responsibility" once the moratorium expires. Nevertheless, around 2,000 people, including hundreds from Netanyahu's own right wing Likud party and a large contingent of flag-waving evangelical Christians, flooded into Revava settlement in the northern West Bank for a rally marking the end of the freeze. Standing in front of a stage draped with a huge banner emblazoned with the slogan "We salute the pioneers of Judaea and Samaria," the crowds counted down from 10 to zero as the sun set over the rugged hills. "The freeze is over," shouted Likud hardliner Danny Danon to roars of approval.

Earlier, settlers laid the cornerstone for a new nursery school in the nearby settlement of Kiryat Netafim in an event organised by Danon, a political hardliner but not a settler himself. But settlers conceded that despite the symbolic displays, there was unlikely to be a flood of construction.

"We are getting back to business as usual and building but we will respect the prime minister's request," said David Ha'ivri, head of the Samaria regional council. Speaking on condition of anonymity, settler sources told AFP they had been given the nod from the premier's office to start building -- but on condition they "don't make a big deal of it."

And other events on the ground could also derail the talks, highlighted by an attack in the West Bank late on Sunday, when suspected Palestinian gunmen opened fire on an Israeli vehicle, lightly wounding two Israelis, including a pregnant woman, the military said. The attack happened south of the city of Hebron near an area where four Israelis were killed in a similar shooting earlier in the month. Jewish settlement of occupied Palestinian land is one of the most bitter aspects of the conflict.

Currently, around 500,000 Israelis live in more than 120 settlements across the West Bank and east Jerusalem, territories the Palestinians want for their promised state. A previous round of direct talks collapsed in December 2008 when Israel launched a war on the Gaza Strip aimed at halting rocket attacks.