President Barack Obama last night ratcheted up pressure on Israel to freeze settlements as he sought to reassure visiting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas of US support for Palestinian statehood.
Faced with an Israeli rebuff of Washington's latest appeal to halt settlement building, Mr Obama held talks with Mr Abbas 10 days after hosting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who remains at odds with the US administration over peacemaking strategy.
Seeking to revive stalled peace efforts, Mr Obama made clear he would continue pushing Mr Netanyahu to impose a total freeze on Jewish settlement construction in the occupied West Bank and embrace the goal of Palestinian statehood.
"We can't continue the drift ... We need to get this thing back on track," Mr Obama told reporters with Mr Abbas, a Western-backed moderate weakened by Hamas Islamists' control of the Gaza Strip, seated at his side in the Oval Office.
Mr Obama stressed that Israel's obligations under a 2003 Middle East peace "road map" include "stopping settlements ... and making sure that there is a viable Palestinian state."
He said Palestinians had to do more to strengthen their security forces and reduce anti-Israel "incitement" he said was sometimes spread in schools and mosques.
In his first Washington visit since Mr Obama took office in January, Mr Abbas had been expected to make his case for a tougher US approach toward Mr Netanyahu, who heads a new right-leaning Israeli coalition with pro-settler parties at its core.
Mr Netanyahu's government yesterday spurned US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's blunt assertion that all settlement activity must stop, including the "natural growth" of existing enclaves that Mr Netanyahu has vowed to continue.
Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev responded by reaffirming Mr Netanyahu's intention to allow some further construction to accommodate the expansion of settler families.
Even as policy differences have exposed a rare US-Israeli rift, it remains unclear how hard Mr Obama is willing to push the Jewish state to make concessions when his administration has yet to complete its Middle East strategy.
Reuters