#news : U.S. vows to resolve Israeli-Palestinian conflict in one year with changed tactic

WASHINGTON, Dec. 8 (Xinhua) -- The United States is changing its approach to handle the Israeli-Palestinian conflict but remains committed to a framework agreement reached within one year, U.S. State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said on Wednesday.

He told reporters that U.S. "intensive discussions" with Israel over its extension of a moratorium on West Bank settlement building over a couple of weeks "had in a sense become an end in itself rather than a means to an end."

The Palestinians have insisted on the moratorium on all occupied lands as a precondition for its return to direct talks with Israel, which have been stalled since mid-September after restart in Washington in early September.

Last month, U.S. State Secretary Hillary Clinton met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York, offering incentives including sale of 20 next-generation stealth fighter planes and U.S. pledge to veto anti-Israel resolutions at the UN Security Council in exchange for a 90-day extension of settlement freeze in the West Bank. But the proposal met fierce opposition from the hard-liners in Netanyahu's cabinet.

"We have determined that a moratorium extension will not at this time provide the best basis for resuming direct negotiations, " Crowley said at a press briefing at the State Department. "We're going to focus on the substance and try to begin to make progress on the core issues themselves."

"I would describe this as a change in tactics, not a change in strategy, it's not a change in our objectives at all," the spokesman added.

He said in the coming days and weeks, the United States will engage with both sides on the core substantive issues at stake in this conflict as well as with Arab states and other international partners to create "a firm basis" to work toward "our shared goal of a framework agreement on all permanent status issues."

The core issues include security, borders, refugees, the status of Jerusalem and water. When relaunching direct talks between the Israelis and the Palestinians in Washington, the Obama administration intended them to resolve all the core issues and reach a peace settlement within one year.

"We continue to pursue a framework agreement on the permanent status issues," Crowley said. "We continue to believe that, in order to resolve those core issues, direct negotiations will be required. And we will be consulting with the parties on the best way to achieve that share goal."

He stressed that "We're shifting our approach, but we're still focused on the goal of a framework agreement within a year, and we believe that's still achievable."

"We're looking to find a way to make progress on the core issues, to move toward that framework agreement, and move toward the point where we end the conflict once and for all," he told reporters.

Though the United States has given up efforts on the settlement issue, "Our position on settlements has not and will not change. The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements, and we will continue to express that position, " Crowley added.

About 430,000 Jews live in well over 100 settlements built across the West Bank and East Jerusalem on land that Israel captured in a 1967 Middle East war. The international community condemn the settlements as illegitimate.

Sphere: Related Content