Vice PM Silvan Shalom: PA Preconditions Threaten Direct Talks

By Barak Ravid and Haaretz Service August 23, 2010

Preconditions will cause the failure of direct Middle East peace talks, even before negotiations commence, Vice Prime Minister Silvan Shalom told Quartet peace envoy Tony Blair on Monday.

Israel and the Palestinians accepted on Friday an invitation by the United States and other powers to restart direct talks on Sept. 2 in a modest step toward forging a peace deal within 12 months to create a Palestinian state and peacefully end one of the world’s most intractable conflicts.

Earlier Monday, Haaretz reported that PA President Mahmoud Abbas had warned that renewed Israeli construction in settlements after the end of the construction freeze in late September would bring the newly-aunched direct negotiations to a grinding halt.

Abbas conveyed the message in letters sent to U.S. President Barack Obama, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and the High Representative of the European Union on Foreign Policy, Catherine Ashton.

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