WE WON'T RECOGNIZE ISRAEL AS JEWISH STATE: ABBAS

West Bank, 10 Rabiul Awal 1435/12 January 2014 (MINA) – Palestinian Authority (PA) chief, President Mahmoud Abbas made the remarks during a speech in front of hundreds of Palestinians in the West bank city of Ramallah on Saturday says he would not recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

he PA chief said he would not accept a solution that fails to include East al-Quds as the capital of a Palestinian state, Press tv reported quoted by Miraj Islamic News Agency (MINA).

Abbas added, Palestinians would not drop demands for a capital in East al-Quds (Jerusalem).

“Without east Jerusalem as a capital of the state of Palestine, there will be no peace between us and Israel,” he said, adding, “We will not recognize it… We will not accept and it’s our right not to recognize the Jewish state.”

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Abbas’s remarks followed a Friday‘s announcement regarding Tel Aviv’s plans to build 1,400 more illegal settlement units — 1,800 according to some reports — in East al-Quds (Jerusalem) amid the so-called peace talks between Palestinian and Israeli officials.

The fresh round of negotiations began in July 2013 to end the decades-long Palestinian-Israeli conflict based on the so-called two-state solution after a three-year hiatus.

Palestinians are seeking to create an independent state on the territories of the West Bank, East al-Quds and the besieged Gaza Strip and are demanding that Israel withdraw from the occupied Palestinian territories.

Tel Aviv, however, has refused to return to the 1967 borders and is unwilling to discuss the issue of al-Quds. Even days before the start of the talks Israel announced plans for more than 2,000 new settler units in East al-Quds and the West Bank, which angered Palestinians.

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Speaking after President Mahmoud Abbas and US Secretary of State John Kerry held three hours of talks in Ramallah that the two sides held intensive talks that went on for several hours over two days during which all positions and ideas were discussed.

Kerry said after the meeting that some progress was made but that more work needs to be done to find a solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

He said he was working on a framework agreement that would guide the two sides in their negotiations.

He said the talks he has had in Palestine and Israel since his arrival here on Thursday ‘have already fleshed out, and even resolved certain kinds of issues and presented new opportunities for others.’

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Kerry said that he was working with great intensity to resolve this conflict that has been going on for too long.

Head of the higher Islamic authority in Jerusalem Sheikh Ikrima Sabri expressed his rejection of the proposals to be tabled by US secretary of state John Kerry during his upcoming visit to occupied Palestine and said they are aimed at prolonging the longevity of the occupation.

In a statement to the Palestinian information center (PIC), Sheikh Sabri said that Kerry’s solutions would deprive the Palestinian refugees of their right to return to their homes they were expelled from and retain Israel’s settlement expansion. (T/P04/P03/mirajnews.com)

Miraj Islamic News Agency (MINA)