PLO official accuses Netanyahu of obstructing direct talks

A senior Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) official on Friday accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of obstructing the direct peace negotiations between the Palestinians and Israel.

Yasser Abed Rabbo, the PLO executive committee's secretary general told the state-run Palestine Television that "Netanyahu gives excuses that he can't move towards freezing settlement due to the situation in his coalition."

He added Netanyahu is the first extremist, who leads the whole process of obstructing the direct peace talks and achieving a real peace. This is the real problem that faces the peace process.

Abed Rabbo stressed that "the Palestinian leadership would never yield to Netanyahu's conditions, mainly recognizing the state of Israel as a Jewish state."

The PLO official revealed that the Arab League follow up committee "would convene in mid November and discuss the results that the peace negotiations had reached amid Netanyahu's stubbornness in relation to settlement freeze."

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas earlier last week said in an interview with the Israeli Television channel I that Netanyahu had rebuffed his proposal to make an undeclared freeze of settlement construction "because he is afraid that his coalition would collapse."

The Palestinians suspended the direct peace talks with Israel on Oct. 2, four weeks after the U.S.-sponsored talks were launched in Washington.

The Palestinian decision was made after the Israeli government refused to extend a 10-month moratorium on freezing settlement construction that ended in Sept. 26.

Source: Xinhua