John Kerry, the US secretary of state, has said that Israeli settlements in the occupied territories are illegitimate and not helpful to ongoing efforts for peace between Palestine and Israel . Kerry s comments on Wednesday came after he met Mahmoud Abbas , the Palestinian president , in Bethlehem. Let me emphasise that the position of the United States is that we consider now , and have always considered, the settlements to be illegitimate, he said . He added that there was no deal that the Palestinians recognised the illegal settlements in return for peace . I want to make it extremely clear that at no time did the Palestinians in any way agree , as a matter of going back to the talks , that they could somehow condone or accept the settlements , he said . Al Jazeera s Mike Hanna, in Jerusalem , said Kerry s statement was strong for a US politician. In the past the phrase has been that the Israeli settlements are not helpful ,” he said . Kerry also announced that the US would provide $75 million to aid the Palestinian economy. Earlier in the day , after meeting the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Shimon Peres , the Israeli president , in occupied Jerusalem , he acknowledged peace talks had run into difficulties. Kerry spoke of a need for real compromises and hard decisions from both sides . President Obama sees the road ahead , as do I, and we share a belief in this process or we wouldn t put time into it , he said during a joint press conference with Netanyahu in Jerusalem . Netanyahu took a harder stance. I am concerned about the progress because I see the Palestinians continuing with incitement , continuing to create artificial crises , continuing to avoid, run away from the historic decisions that are needed to make a genuine peace , he said with Kerry at his side .
Posted on: Wed, 06 Nov 2013 17:04:43 +0000
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