US MIDDLE East peace envoy George Mitchell will meet Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu again this evening as Washington presses ahead with efforts to get the Israeli-Palestinian peace process back on track.
The prime minister’s office in Jerusalem described talks yesterday as “useful and productive”, but provided no details.
Mr Mitchell is seeking a formula acceptable to both sides in order to renew bilateral peace talks that have been frozen ever since Mr Netanyahu took over as prime minister in March.
The main sticking point remains the scope and duration of an Israeli settlement freeze demanded by the Palestinian leadership as a precondition for resuming talks.
Despite months of arduous contacts that have so far failed to break the deadlock, Mr Mitchell said he was determined to press on. “President Obama and the US government remain deeply and firmly committed to achieving a comprehensive peace,” he told reporters ahead of talks with Israeli president Shimon Peres.
Mr Peres told the US envoy that expectations were on the rise and that time was short. He warned that suspending the peace process would be dangerous.
As Mr Mitchell met with Israeli leaders in Jerusalem yesterday, the country’s security forces were on heightened alert in the city, where Hamas had declared a “day of rage” to protest at Israeli restrictions on access to the Temple Mount in the Old City, a site holy to both Muslims and Jews.
Eleven policemen were lightly hurt in clashes with Palestinians after Muslim prayers and two protesters were arrested, but the day passed off relatively peacefully.
An Israeli woman was seriously hurt when Palestinians threw rocks at the car she was driving in the northern West Bank.
About 100 Palestinian and Israeli Arab demonstrators have been arrested over the past two weeks but Israeli police chiefs yesterday expressed the hope that the protests had now peaked.
Jerusalem district police commander Aharon Franco said, “In the next day or two we’ll try to go back to routine and return the Mount to routine as well.”
Mr Franco explained that the Temple Mount would once again be opened to Muslim worshippers of all ages, after being restricted to men over the age of 50 during recent days.
In Gaza thousands of residents rallied to protest at Israeli actions.
The Islamic Movement in Israel blamed the tension on the unprecedented police presence around the Temple Mount and Arab neighbourhoods in East Jerusalem.
The Palestinian Authority has accused Israel of seeking to “Judaise” east Jerusalem, and of allowing Jewish extremists access to the al-Aqsa mosque.