Mahmoud Abbas calls for freeze on settlement construction:

On the first day of negotiations with Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday called on Israel to freeze all construction in settlements at the launch of direct negotiations with the White House between the two parties under the auspices of the United States.

“We reiterate our commitment to fulfill our obligations and we urge the Israelis to complete their own, including a freeze on all activities (construction) in the colonies,” said Mahmoud Abbas, along with Israeli

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of U.S. and Egyptian presidents Barack Obama and Hosni Mubarak and King Abdullah of Jordan.

This gel, said the Palestinian leader, “is not a precondition (the negotiations), but a goal to implement an obligation on which there is an agreement.” The Israeli settlement, a stumbling block size. The issue of Israeli settlement in the West Bank, on which the Netanyahu government has declared a moratorium that expires Sept. 26, is a stumbling block size in the peace process.

Benjamin Netanyahu reaffirmed to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that the freeze would end on schedule, his office said Wednesday. The spokesman for Mahmoud Abbas warned that restarting construction “would doom the
negotiations to fail.