Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has declined a US request to freeze a project to build dozens of housing units in an east Jerusalem settlement, Israeli army radio reported on Tuesday.
US Middle East envoy George Mitchell had recently asked the hawkish premier to halt the project in Gilo, saying it risks raising tensions with Palestinians amid floundering efforts by Washington to restart peace negotiations, it said.
But Netanyahu refused, saying that the project did not require government approval and that Gilo was “an integral part of Jerusalem,” it said.
Asked to comment on the report, a senior Israeli official would say only that Netanyahu “is ready to show the maximum restraint when it comes to construction in Judea and Samaria (West Bank) to help restart negotiations, but this policy does not apply in Jerusalem, our capital.”
“Who are they to decide for us where to build?” wondered an Israeli Border Guard officer in Gilo settlement. “This is a neighborhood within Israel and it hurts me to see that the Americans, who are operating in Iraq without blinking, tell us what to do inside Israel,” he continued.
Gilo lies in the mostly Arab east Jerusalem that Israel captured along with the West Bank from Jordan in the 1967 Six Day War and later annexed in a move not recognized by the international community.
According to the Road Map plan and the Arab Peace Initiative, a two-state solution would see a Palestinian state established on lands occupied in 1967, including the areas of Jerusalem Netanyahu calls part of the “unified city.
Notes/Sources:
1.Haaretz
2.JPost
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